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Trace and reproduction are also central themes in Molly Springfield’s media-reflexive works. Drawings by Molly Springfield (*1977 in Columbia, S.C., lives and works in Washington, D.C.) show meticulously rendered photocopies of literary, philosophical, or photo-historical books. The graphite drawings not only depict the text, but also the notes, dog-ears and imperfections left on the pages by the processes of reading and photocopying. In an age of copy and paste Molly Springfield’s drawings invoke the spirit of passed down knowledge.
Through Springfield’s faithfully rendering every letter and every shadow by hand until they become abstract shapes no different from images, the drawings embrace the materiality of language and tie in with positions of conceptual art, but also reference historical discourses about the question of mechanical reproduction and its reverberations in visual art.
Born in 1977 in Columbia, South Carolina, USA.
Lives and works in Washington D.C., USA.
Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, Skowhegan, Memphis
M.F.A., University of California, Berkeley, California
Post-Baccalaureate Certificate, Maryland Institute College of Art, Baltimore, Maryland
B.A., Queens College, Charlotte, North Carolina
Artist in Residence, Tamarind Institute, Albuquerque, New Mexico
Arts and Humanities Fellowship, D.C. Commission on Arts & Humanities
Arts and Humanities Fellowship, D.C. Commission on Arts & Humanities
Arts and Humanities Fellowship, D.C. Commission on Arts & Humanities
Visual Artist Fellowship, The MacDowell Colony, Peterborough, New Hampshire
Artist in Residence, The Hambidge Center for the Creative Arts & Sciences, Rabun Gap, Georgia
Visual Artist Fellowship, D.C. Commission on Arts & Humanities
Visual Artist Fellowship, D.C. Commission on the Arts & Humanities / National Endowment for the Arts
Visual Artist Fellowship, D.C. Commission on the Arts & Humanities / National Endowment for the Arts
Visual Artist Fellowship, D.C. Commission on the Arts & Humanities / National Endowment for the Arts
Finalist, Janet & Walter Sondheim Prize, Baltimore Museum of Art, Maryland
Finalist, The Trawick Prize, Bethesda Contemporary Art Award
Visual Artist Fellowship, D.C. Commission on Arts & Humanities / National Endowment for the Arts
Finalist, Janet & Walter Sondheim Prize, Baltimore Museum of Art, Maryland
Finalist, The Trawick Prize, National Gallery of Mid-Atlantic Arts Foundation Creative Fellowship
Artist in Residence, Millay Colony for the Arts, Austerlitz, New York
Skowhegan Fellowship, Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture
Grant, D.C. Commission on Arts & Humanities / National Endowment for the Arts
Eisner Prize for Highest Achievement in the Creative Arts, University of California, Berkeley, California
Outstanding Graduate Student Instructor Award, University of California, Berkeley, California
Full Tuition Grant, University of California, Berkeley, California
Departmental Block Grant, University of California, Berkeley, California
Molly Springfield. The Marginalia Archive, Gambrell Center for the Arts, Queens University, Charlotte, North Carolina
Molly Springfield. Excerpts, Cody Gallery, Marymount University, Arlington, Virginia
Molly Springfield. This document, Galerie Thomas Zander, Cologne, Germany
Molly Springfield. The Marginalia Archive, Flashpoint, Washington, D.C.
Molly Springfield. The Marginalia Archive, Steven Wolf Gallery, San Francisco, California
Molly Springfield. The Proto-History of the Internet, Thomas Robertello Gallery, Chicago, Illinois
Molly Springfield. Translation, Thomas Robertello Gallery, Chicago, Illinois
Molly Springfield. Translation, Steven Wolf Gallery, San Francisco, California
Molly Springfield. The World is Full of Objects, Mireille Mosler Ltd., New York
Molly Springfield. The Real Object, Thomas Robertello Gallery, Chicago, Illinois
Molly Springfield. Gentle Reader, Transformer, Washington, D.C.
Molly Springfield. They go on telling you just the same thing forever, Steven Wolf Fine Arts, San Francisco, California
Molly Springfield. Anything we have not had to decipher on our own does not belong to us, JET, Washington, D.C.
Molly Springfield. collecting/cataloguing/recording/seeing, Arts Club of Washington, Washington, D.C.
The Collaborative: Interlude, The Kreeger Museum Georgetown, Washington D.C, District of Columbia, USA
The Barlow Gilotty Collection, American University Museum, Washington, DC, USA
Take the Long Way Home, ARTspace, New York
Conference Call: Baxter Koziol and Molly Springfield, Skowhegan, New York City, New York
BOOKS. An exhibition of books about art and art about books, Galerie Thomas Zander, Cologne, Germany
Dialogues, STABLE, Washington, D.C.
Assembly 2019, Arlington Arts Center, Arlington, Virginia
Incommunicado, Montpelier Arts Center, Laurel, Maryland
Distance, Dorsky Gallery, Long Island City, New York
Proust, Williams Collection, Wellesley, Massachusetts
MICA Alumni Biennial Exhibition, Maryland Institute College of Art, Baltimore, Maryland
Deep Dive, WAS Gallery, Bethesda, Maryland (with Suzanne Gold and Sandy Guttman)
Invitational Show, McNamee Gallery, St. Louis University, St. Louis, Montana
Drawing In/Drawing Out, The Phillips Museum of Art, Franklin & Marshall College, Lancaster, Pennsylvania
Camp Artscape, Center for the Arts Gallery, Towson University, Towson, Maryland
Dog and Pony Show: A Sondheim Alumni Exhibition, Area 405, Baltimore, Maryland
Greetings from Adams Morgan, DCAC, Washington, D.C.
Take Note, Gutstein Gallery, SCAD, Savannah, Georgia
Click Here, Arlington Arts Center, Arlington, Virginia
Homage, Williams Collection, Wellesley, Massachusetts
Marginalias, Field Projects, New York
From Line to Constellation, Granoff Center for the Creative Arts, Brown University, curated by Francesca Capone Mood Board, Furthermore, Washington, D.C.
Select 2015: WPA’s 34th Annual Art Auction Exhibition, Artisphere, Arlington, VA
Art=Text=Art: Private Languages/Public Systems, UB Anderson Gallery, University at Buffalo, New York
Drawing Time, Reading Times, The Drawing Center, New, York
Autocorrect, Josée Bienvenue Gallery, New York
New Positions: Philipp Gronon, Owen Kydd, Molly Springfield, Galerie Thomas Zander, Cologne, Germany
Chick Lit: Revised Summer Reading, Tracy Williams, Ltd., New York,
Slippage, Center for the Arts Gallery, Towson University, Maryland
Art=Text=Art: Works by Contemporary Artists, selections from the Sally & Wynn Kramarsky Collection, Hafnarborg: The Hafnarfjordur Centre of Culture and Fine Art, Hafnarfjordur, Iceland
Graphite, curated by Sarah Urist Green, Indianapolis Museum of Art, Indianapolis, Indiana
Falling Through Space Drawn by the Line, University of Buffalo Art Gallery, Center for the Arts, Buffalo, New York
FAX, San Francisco Arts Commission Gallery, San Francisco, California; DeVos Art Museum, Marquette, Michigan and Salt Lake Art Center, Utah
Art=Text=Art: Works by Contemporary Artists, selections from the Sally & Wynn Kramarsky Collection, Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers University, New Brunswick, New Jersey
Out of Print, Mercer Union, Centre for Contemporary Art, Toronto, Canada
Art=Text=Art: Works by Contemporary Artists, selections from the Sally & Wynn Kramarsky Collection, Harnett Museum of Art, University of Richmond Museums, Virginia
In – and outside – writing, Voorkamer, Lier, Belgium
FAX, The Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, London Gallery, London, UK; Knoxville Museum of Art, Knoxville, Tennessee and St. Paul Street Gallery, Auckland, New Zealand
False Documents and Other Illusions, Portland Museum of Art, Portland, Maine
Catalyst, American University Museum at the Katzen Art Center, Washington D.C.
Observant, ISE Cultural Foundation, New York
Beyond Text and Image: The Book as Art, Washington and Lee University, Lexington, Virginia
On/Off the Grid, Irvine Contemporary, Washington, D.C.
FAX, The Torrance Art Museum, Torrance, California; Para/Site Art Space, Hong Kong; Burnaby Art Gallery, Burnaby, Canada; Museo de Arte Carrillo Gil, Mexico City, Mexico; Dowd Gallery, State University of New York, Cortland and New Galerie, Paris, France
The Drawing Room, Mireille Mosler, Ltd., New York
Leaded: The Materiality and Metamorphosis of Graphite, The Art Museum of South Texas, Corpus Christi, Texas; Memorial Art Gallery of the University of Rochester, Rochester, New York; Yellowstone Art Museum, Billings, Montana and The Palmer Museum of Art, Pennsylvania State University, State College, Pennsylvania
FAX, The Contemporary Museum, Baltimore, Maryland
Plug in ICA, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada
X LIBRIS: The Repurposed Book, Traffic Zone Center for Visual Art, Minneapolis, Minnesota
The Trawick Prize: Contemporary Art Awards, Fraser Gallery, Bethesda, Maryland
The Janet and Walter Sondheim Prize Finalist, Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore, Maryland
Tuttle, David Castillo Gallery, Miami, Florida
The Janet and Walter Sondheim Prize Finalists, Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore, Maryland
Idiolects, BROWN Gallery, London, UK
Looking Back, Mireille Mosler Ltd., New York
The Trawick Prize: Contemporary Art Awards, Heineman Myers Contemporary, Bethesda, Maryland
At Arm’s Length, Nurture Art, Brooklyn, New York
Lie to the Eye, Bakersfield Museum of Art, Bakersfield, California
Leaded: The Materiality and Metamorphosis of Graphite, Western Washington University Gallery, Bellingham, Washington; Salina Art Center, Salina, Kansas; Baum Gallery of Fine Art, University of Central Arkansas
Simple, Dumb Objects, 1708 Gallery, Richmond, Virginia
Kinsey Confidential, Kinsey Institute, Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana
Leaded: The Materiality and Metamorphosis of Graphite, Joel and Lila Harnett Museum, University of Richmond Museums, Richmond, Virginia
Bedford Gallery, Dean Lesher Center for the Arts, Walnut Creek, California
The Janet and Walter Sondheim Prize Semi-Finalists, Maryland Institute
College of Art, Baltimore, Maryland, selected by Robert Storr (Yale School of Art), Becky Smith (Bellwether Gallery) and Derrick Adams (artist)
Simple, Dumb Objects, School 33, Baltimore, Maryland
Re Draw, curated by Katy Porte, Brooklyn Fire Proof, Brooklyn, New York
The Reality of Things: Trompe l’Oeil in America, Vero Beach Museum of Art, Vero Beach, Florida
Text Formed Drawing, Contemporary Art Galleries, University of Connecticut, Storrs, Connecticut
Private Viewing, Whitney/Columbia Curatorial Studies Program, Leroy Neiman Gallery, Columbia University, New York
Exchange, WPA/C, Baltimore, Maryland and Richmond, Virginia
The Trawick Prize, Creative Partners Gallery, Bethesda, Maryland
Introductions, Thomas Robertello Gallery, Chicago, Illinois
Well Read, Nurture Art, Brooklyn, New York
Circa 75, New Langton Arts, San Francisco, California
Marking Traces, 33 Grand Gallery, Oakland, California
Seven, Washington Project for the Arts/Corcoran, Washington, D.C.
Seeded: The Word/The Tree, RKL Gallery, Brooklyn, New York
Land of the Free, Jack Hanley Gallery, San Francisco, California
Cream: From the Top, Arts Benicia, Benicia, California
Compass Points, Berkeley Art Museum, Berkeley, California
The Opening Band, I-5 Gallery, Los Angeles, California
Equivalents and Analogues, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut
Drawing Sentences, Worth Ryder Gallery, Berkeley, California
Fluid Exchange, California College of the Arts, San Francisco, California
Sarah Urist Green: You Are an Artist. Assignments to Spark Creation, The Art Assignment
Ellen Mueller, Remixing and Drawing: Sources, Influences, Styles (Routledge Focus, New York)
Molly Springfield. This document. Leporello, Galerie Thomas Zander, Cologne, Germany
Excerpts (The Marginalia Archive), Art Papers, March/April
Invalid Format: An Anthology of Triple Canopy, Volume 3 (Triple Canopy, New York, and Sternberg Press, Berlin)
Jonn Herschend and Will Rogan, The Thing The Book: A Monument to the Book as Object (Chronicle Books, San Francisco)
Zachary Sachs, Critics’ Picks: Drawing Time, Reading Time, Artforum.com, December
Ken Johnson, When How It Looks Matters More Than What It Says: ‘Drawing Time, Reading Time’ at the Drawing Center, The New York Times, November 22
Claire Gilman, Drawing Time, Reading Time, catalogue essay, The Drawing Center Claire Brandon, Molly Springfield, catalogue essay for Graphite, Indianapolis Museum of Art Brandon Brown, The Marginalia Archive, Art Practical, February
Kenneth Baker, Molly Springfield at Steven Wolf, San Francisco Chronicle, February 1
Invalid Format: An Anthology of Triple Canopy, Volume 2 Triple Canopy, New York and Sternberg Press, Berlin
Philip Barlow, collector profile, The Studio Visit, August
Tracking Changes, Triple Canopy: Annotations, June 11
Rachel Wolff, Giving Graphite a Grand Show, The Wall Street Journal, December 21
Beth Capper, Molly Springfield at Thomas Robertello Gallery, Modern Painters, October
R.C. Baker, Art = Text = Art: Works by Contemporary Artists, The Village Voice, September
Martyn Pedler, Empty Bottles and Personal Alphabets: It Is Almost That, Bookslut, August
Randall Miller, Molly Springfield and ‘The Proto – History of the Internet’, Daily Serving, June 28
Stacia Yeapanis, OthersPeoplesPixels Interviews Molly Springfield, Opp Artist Blog, May 3
Lisa Pearson, Ed. It Is Almost That: A Collection of Image + Text Work by Women Artists & Writers (Siglio Press, Los Angeles) Lily Cox-Richard, artist profile, The Studio Visit, June
It Is Almost That (box), limited edition boxed set of ten saddle-stitched artist booklets (Siglio Press, Los Angeles)
100 Artists of Washington, edited by F. Lennox Campello (Schiffer Publishing Inc.)
John Priestly, Art=Text=Art, Art Papers, November/December
Joan Waltemath, Art=Text=Art curated by Elizabeth Schlatter, The Brooklyn Rail, October
Ingrid Langston, Molly Springfield, catalogue essay for Art=Text=Art, selections from the Sally and Wynn Kramarksy Collection
Nancy Princenthal, It Is Almost That (book review), Art In Print, September-October, Vol. 1 No. 3
Russell Smith, Regarding the book’s mortality, and also its surreal charm, The Globe And Mail (Toronto), January 12
Sean Prpick, Closing the Book, CBC—Radio Canada, January 31
Daniel Kany, ‘False Documents’ is genuinely excellent, The Portland Press Herald, December 5
Michael O’Sullivan, ‘Catalyst’ looks at WPA, a place Washington area artists have called home, Washington Post, November 18
Inside the Mundaneum, Triple Canopy, Issue 8, March
Gretchen Schermerhorn, artist profile, The Studio Visit, December
Noelle Tan, artist profile, The Studio Visit, May Bill Berkson and Molly Springfield, Translation and Dear Molly Proust, Big Bridge, Issue 14
Annie Larmon,’Trompe L’oeil: False Documents & Other Illusions’, The Portland Phoenix, November 3
Rob Walker, Art That Sells Itself, The New York Times Magazine, May 8
Louis Jacobson, ‘On/Off the Grid’ at Irvine Contemporary, Washington City Paper, February 24
Jason Foumberg, Eat Your Words But Don’t Go Hungry (Molly Springfield at Thomas Robertello Gallery), Newcity Art, September 14
Lauren Viera, Our favorite fall art shows in Chicago, Chicago Tribune, September 11
Michael O’Sullivan, Competition brings artists down to earth, Washington Post, September 11
Mary Carole McCauley, As Faxes Fade, They Become Art: Contemporary Museum’s touring show features spontaneity, randomness, Baltimore Sun, September 10
Candice Weber, Molly Springfield, Translation, Art Talk Chicago, September
Karsten Lund, Molly Springfield: Translation, Flavorpill Chicago, September 5
Bret McCabe, The 2009 Sondheim Prize: Molly Springfield, Baltimore City Paper, July 8
Tim Smith, Sondheim finalists present collage of ideas, Baltimore Sun, June 28
Martin L. Johnson, Signs of the Times, Baltimore City Paper, April 14
Johnny Ray Houston, Copy This, San Francisco Bay Guardian, March 11
Kenneth Baker, Proust in “Translation” at Wolf, San Francisco Chronicle, February 28
Tiffany Maleshefski, Drawings found in ‘Translation’, San Francisco Examiner, February 26
Martin L. Johnson, The Sondheim Prize: Molly Springfield, Baltimore City Paper, July 9
Looking Back, Goings on About Town, The New Yorker, July 7 & 14
Edward Gunts, Sondheim finalists’ work reflect changing world, The Baltimore Sun, June 29
Lauren O’Neill-Butler, Molly Springfield, Artforum, March
Andy Kozlowski, Leaded, Art Papers, January/February
Amoreen Armetta, Molly Springfield, Artforum, January/February
R.C. Baker, Best in Show: Molly Springfield, Village Voice, January 2
Alisha Kerlin, Full of Objects, Again, Gay City Times, December 20
Alan Artner, Photos spur closer scrutiny of subjects, Chicago Tribune, May 4
Craig Drennen, Interview with Molly Springfield, Drain Magazine, Issue 8 (Spring)
Kristin Gehring, On the Scene, Chicago Journal, April 25
Rodger Stevens, Redraw, Williamsburg And Greenpoint Monthly Art Guide, March 1
Voices: Molly Springfield, NY Arts Magazine, November
Peter Winant, Best Bet: Molly Springfield’s Gentle Reader, WETA-TV (PBS), November
Jeffry Cudlin, Molly Springfield: Gentle Reader, Washington City Paper, November 3
Michael O’Sullivan, Trawick Prize Winners’ Attention to Details, Washington Post, Sept. 22
Well Read, Goings on About Town, The New Yorker, May 8
Michael O’Sullivan, Text: Reading Between the Lines, Washington Post, April 7
Huan Hsu, Text Messaging: With a photocopier and a pencil, Molly Springfield draws meaning from the printed page, Washington City Paper, March 23
Glen Helfand, Knockoffs: Kaz Oshiro and Molly Springfield repurpose your junk, San Francisco Bay Guardian, February 22
The Bookshelf: Molly Springfield, College Art Association News, September
Kriston Capps, Top Ten Gallery Shows from 2005, DCIST, December 30
Jessica Dawson, Molly Springfield: Still Passing Notes In Class, Washington Post, March
City Hall Art Collection, Washington, D.C.
Sally & Wynn Kramarsky Collection, New York
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York
Zander Galerie
Schönhauser Straße 8
50968 Cologne
Germany
Zander Galerie
6 Rue Jacob
75006 Paris
France
