CURRENT Exhibition
Pardon Me While I Dissociate
Curated by Rachel Eboh
Exhibition Dates: November 7th to 22rd, 2025
Artist Reception: Friday, November 7, 7-10 pm, 2025
Austin Studio Tour Participant: November 8-9, 15-16 12-6pm
Open Hours: Fridays and Saturdays, 12-6pm or by appointment
Image: Lee Barber, We’ve Developed a Taste for Isolation, 2025
Exhibition Dates: November 7th to 22rd, 2025
Artist Reception: Friday, November 7, 7-10 pm, 2025
Austin Studio Tour Participant: November 8-9, 15-16 12-6pm
Open Hours: Fridays and Saturdays, 12-6pm or by appointment
ICOSA presents: Pardon Me While I Dissociate, a juried group exhibition curated by Rachel Eboh. Dissociation, a mental process of detachment in response to trauma, has increasingly entered the cultural lexicon as a way to describe one’s response to experiences of sociopolitical overwhelm. While its psychological usage can point to escapism or involuntary physical symptoms such as paralysis, its colloquial definition suggests an action that is both intentional and transitory. Reimagined as a necessary and temporary tool to attain reprieve before snapping back to reality; the term now claims the coping mechanism as a catalyst. Pardon Me While I Dissociate, a juried group exhibition featuring eleven distinct artists, examines this expanded definition of dissociation. Together, the works showcase the vast range of emotional responses that occur in an active state of detachment as well as the touchstones and events that bring life back into focus.
Featured artists: Forrest Aderholt, Connie Arismendi, Lee Barber, Joshua Duttweiler, Tahia Farhin Haque, Allysha Farmer, Ling-lin Ku, Brianna McDonald, Mihee Nahm, Weylin, Brantly Sheffield, Alvaro J. Soto
About the Curator:
Rachel Eboh is an Austin-based curator, writer, and researcher. She is currently a curatorial assistant at The Contemporary Austin where she has helped organize exhibitions such as Carl Cheng: Nature Never Loses (2024) and the upcoming The Canvas Can Do Miracles (2025). She is also the co-editor of the forthcoming exhibition and resource catalogue Carl Cheng: Nature Never Loses and curator of the recent group exhibition Positioning Systems at Northern- Southern. Rachel received her MA in curatorial studies from Bard College in 2023 and her BA from NYU’s Gallatin School of Individualized Study in 2016. At Bard’s Hessel Museum she curated the exhibition Open Secret with Hương Ngô and Nina Valerie Kolowratnik as well as co-curated the exhibitions Work Under Maintenance and Ñande Róga from the The Feliciano Centurión Archival Collection at The Institute for Studies on Latin American Art (ISLAA), New York where it later traveled. Prior, she was the director of Tina Kim Gallery, New York where she helped organize contemporary art exhibitions such as Davide Balliano (2021), Tania Pérez Córdova: Short Sight Box(2020), Suki Seokyeong Kang: Jeong (2018), and Minouk Lim: Mamour (2017). She also helped mount historic solo exhibitions by Korean modern masters such as Kim Tschang-Yeul: New York to Paris (2019), Suh-Seung-Won: Early Works 1960s–1980s (2019), and Lee Seung Jio: Nucleus (2020).
Pardon Me While I Dissociate
Curated by Rachel Eboh
Exhibition Dates: November 7th to 22rd, 2025
Artist Reception: Friday, November 7, 7-10 pm, 2025
Austin Studio Tour Participant: November 8-9, 15-16 12-6pm
East Austin Arts District Third Thursday/ Curator’s Walkthrough: November 20, 6-9pm, 2024
Gallery Hours: Fridays & Saturdays 12-6 pm or by appointment
ICOSA Collective Gallery
916 Springdale Rd, Bldg 2, #102, Austin, TX 78702
www.icosacollective.com