Sonya Bogdanova

Bisqued stoneware, slip, underglaze
2024-

2023 | Parlour and Ramp, Chicago, IL

A good product is underhanded. No pussyfooting, no room for doubt. Leave them doubting, but you stay on the level. Leave them with a tight-lipped smile, never letting on how deep you are. It does not matter what you leave behind; reward is the North Star. You only answer to the director. The director needs you bad, not for what you leave behind but for what you are. The director puts you places. No one understands how you ended up there. The director (and let’s face it, your will) put you between the brick and the drywall. It is rotting.

2023 | Backspace Gallery, Northern Illinois University

A finch flies over a sea of sand, near what we call Alamogordo, New Mexico. The finch looks through patches of dissipating clouds at the sand many miles below. A storm's aftermath is in the air, and the fiery sun is slowly rising. The clouds cast strange shadows on the sand. The finch suddenly sees red, and is then blinded and ceases to exist. One cloud turns red, purple, finally blue. This cloud was a dream, and this dream keeps occurring throughout the world.

Stoneware, plaster, urethane foam, glaze, shellac, acrylic
Variable dimensions
2022-23 | Ignition Projects, Chicago, IL

Sonya Bogdanova came to the United States with her family from Moscow in 1998; they militantly adhered to the concept of the American dream, which she never saw come to fruition. After years of inability to reconcile her material life with the promises of capital, Bogdanova began to experience derealization. Clouds became her personal dream icons. A Dream We Dream Together is Reality is an ongoing project addressing the allure of dreaming, who gets to do it, and how it affects us. Sculpted clouds are scattered across the floor, furniture, and walls; visitors are encouraged to cradle the forms in the hopes of embodying them. Manmade clouds from clay and foam are perversions of the floating, airy forms we encounter in nature. What can we glean from these effigies, or even golems? What happens when we try to make the dream real?

Clay, glaze, acrylic, glue
36 x 12 x 18”
2021

Untitled (Sonya Bogdanova for Western Pole)
Latex, polyfil, glue, duct tape, street pole
9 x 12 x 3”
2021

Clay, plastic, acrylic, house paint
Variable dimensions
2021 | Terrain Biennial

Aluminum, wood, clay, glaze, spray paint, epoxy
3 x 4 x 10’
2021 | Ignition Projects, Chicago, IL

Metal, wood, canvas, urethane foam, acrylic, cotton, sound
6 x 3.5 x 8’
2021 | Chicago Cultural Center | Gallery 400, Chicago, IL

Acknowledgements: Matt Mancini, Jacob Boglio, Graham Livingston, Mark Guinto, Pushpakanthan Pakkiyarajah, Caleb MacKenzie, Tamara Becerra Valdez, Juan Baños, Asya Dubrovina, and Nick Merlock Jackson

Concrete, wire, wood, plastic bags, papier mache, found paper, cardboard, tape, staples, acrylic, tempera, house paint, and cinder blocks
9 x 10 x 12’
2020

Big Man
Acrylic, gel medium, canvas, muslin, and polyester on plywood
8 x 2’
2019

Feeble
Acrylic, India ink, gel medium, canvas, muslin, and found fabrics on plywood
8 x 2’
2019

Untitled
Acrylic, India ink, and carving on plywood
8 x 2’
2019

Untitled
Acrylic on masonite
8 x 4’
2019