Standing in the Shower… Thinking curated by Rachel Waldrop

October 2 – 30
Standing in the Shower… Thinking curated by Rachel Waldrop in the Balcony Gallery
Opening reception: Friday, October 2, 5:00-9:00 PM
Gallery hours: Monday-Friday, 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM & Saturday, 10:00 AM – 1:00 PM
The Emporium Center, 100 S. Gay Street, Knoxville, TN 37902

Standing in the Shower… Thinking curated by Rachel Waldrop in the Balcony Gallery

Standing in the Shower… Thinking is one of the more revealing songs on Jane’s Addiction’s debut 1988 studio album, Nothing’s Shocking. The song is set in a physical and psychological time and place that we all know well: the quotidian act of taking a hot shower becomes an opportunity for fertile inner monologues—perhaps about fears and vulnerabilities, sexuality, intimacy and relationships, or simply reminders of daily life. With a range of included works made over the past 10 years, artists Harry Kagan, John Paul Kessling, and Victoria Sauer pursue and exploit the site of a shower—and shower thoughts—to differing degrees. Centering the bathroom, and thereby larger ideas of human figuration, connection, and representations of intimacy and meditation as universal experiences—their paintings, photographs, and ceramics in Standing in the Shower…Thinking approach the subject with both humor and humanity.

A curator talk and gallery tour will take place at 4pm on Friday, October 2 in the Balcony Gallery.

Harry Kagan’s artistic tiles, individually small in form yet collectively large when scaled together, speak directly to the domestic construction materials of a bathroom. Artist Website: www.harrykagan.com | Instagram: @harrykagan

John Paul Kesling’s paintings, polaroids, and videos expose the complexities of human intimacy, both romantic and familial. Artist Website: www.johnpaulkesling.com | Instagram: @johnpaulkesling

Victoria Sauer’s paintings from the past decade have scrutinized, in her hyper realistic style, the unspoken and overlooked experiences of everyday life, what she describes as “the moments residing within a level of reality that we find familiar but frequently ignore.” Artist Website: www.victoriasauer.com | Instagram: @victoriasauerart

Just as in the song’s lyrics, the repeated refrain “standing in the shower…thinking” reinforces that none of the ideas are fully resolved: they’re admittedly passing thoughts, almost like intrusive reflections or obsessions, rather than any coherent philosophy.

Rachel Waldrop is director and curator of the Athenaeum, UGA’s contemporary art space in downtown Athens, GA, and director of the Dodd Galleries in the Lamar Dodd School of Art since 2025. From 2020-2025, Waldrop was director and curator of the Institute of Contemporary Art at the University of Tennessee Chattanooga. Waldrop has been working with artists, writing about, and teaching in the field of contemporary art for 20 years and held positions in New York, Philadelphia, Savannah, Atlanta, Chattanooga, and Athens. Instagram: @hello_rachelwaldrop