Elijah Burgher

Elijah Burgher (b. 1978, U.S.A.) lives and works in Chicago. Burgher is an artist and occasional writer who aims to contribute to the strain of countercultural queer mysticism exemplified by figures such as Jean Genet, Kenneth Anger, and Hakim Bey. His works, mostly drawings, have their sources in imagination, found stories, historical artworks, but take root in the artist’s daily life and personal history. Beside figurative drawings, where men are engaged in ritual activities, he creates sigils, magical emblems conceived after an historical method of spell casting developed by occultist Austin Osman Spare (1886-1956), in which the letters spelling out a wish are combined into a new symbol. Thus he creates icons that utilize the language and history of abstraction. He has exhibited in solo shows at Western Exhibitions, Chicago (2012); 2nd Floor Projects, San Francisco (2011); and Shane Campbell Gallery, Oak Park (2010); and two-persons shows at Lump, Raleigh (2012); and Peregrine Program, Chicago (2009). Recent group shows include exhibitions at H.F. Johnson Gallery of Art, Kenosha (2012); 92YTribeca (2012), Anna Kustera (2011), and Envoy Enterprises (2010), New York City; Famous Accountants, Brooklyn (2011); and Noma, San Francisco (2011). Burgher has taught in Contemporary Practices and Painting and Drawing since Fall 2010. He received a MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2004, and a BA from Sarah Lawrence College, Bronxville, in 2000, where he studied Literature.