Kantor Gallery is proud to present Postcards (2017-2020), a solo exhibition of paintings by Serena Stevens. The show will be on view at the gallery from December 21, 2020 through January 15, 2021. 

Beginning in 1902 Kodak offered a preprinted card back that allowed postcards to be made directly from negatives. This technology allowed photographers to travel from town to town and document life in the places they visited. 

After a time local entrepreneurs hired photographers to record area events and the homes of prominent citizens. These postcards documented important buildings and sites, as well as parades, fires, and floods. Realtors used them to sell new housing by writing descriptions and prices on the back. Real photo postcards became expressions of pride in home and community, and were also sold as souvenirs in local drug stores and stationery shops.

The show title Postcards is used as a reference to snippets of images that reminds you of a place. Usually a place one passed thru. In Stevens’ case that is New Mexico, Rhode Island, Laguna Beach, and Iowa, where Serena lived at different times and where she painted the works in this exhibition. Painted images from photos she had taken, from childhood scrapbooks, and from memories of the past.

Serena Stevens was born in 1988 in Ft.Madison, Iowa.

Postcards (2017-2020) is on view by appointment only starting December 21, 2020 through January 15, 2021, Monday through Friday from 12pm to 5pm. For more information or to book an appointment to view the exhibition please email [email protected].