Locust Projects is proud to present LAB MFA, a national open call to graduate-level artists for an exhibition in one of our organization’s project spaces. Locust Projects hosts a yearly application and selection process in the spring for a summer exhibition opening. 

For this year’s LAB MFA exhibition, Locust Projects is pleased to invite Julian Gilbert-Davis, a first-year MFA student at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, NJ. Gilbert-Davis will develop and exhibit his project Neighbors in Locust Projects’ back project space. Drawing a dialogue between polling places in Miami and New Brunswick, the artist will investigate the architectural vernaculars and common artifacts found in these sites. Approaching the work as an extended research project, Gilbert-Davis will reconstruct elements from his polling place at Rutgers (a local high school) and Locust Projects’ nearest voting location (a neighborhood church). With consideration to the civic ritual of voting, Neighbors investigates the polling place as shrine and public commons, examining the democratic ideals and institutions it sustains. 

ABOUT THE ARTISTS

Julian Gilbert-Davis (b. Chicago, IL) received his BFA from CalArts in 2008 and is currently pursuing his MFA at Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ. He previously served as a lecturer at the Yale School of Art. His work has been exhibited at MOCA Tucson, AZ; Bakehouse Art Complex, Miami, FL; the Zimmerli Museum, New Brunswick, NJ; and the New Haven Museum, New Haven, CT, among others.