“McGuire’s work emerges from the complex networks of history, narrative, and action within our contemporary technological landscape. She tinkers with the forms we inherit, testing their limits in the process.” – Juror Giampaolo Bianconi, Dittmer Associate Curator, Modern and Contemporary Art at the Art Institute of Chicago.

Isabelle Frances McGuire (b. 1994, Austin, TX) lives and works in Chicago, IL. Select solo and two-person presentations include, Year Zero, The Renaissance Society, Chicago (2024); The First Machine, What Pipeline, Detroit (2023, with Nolan Simon); Loop, King’s Leap, New York (2023); Bailey Connolly and Isabelle Frances McGuire, Scherben, Berlin (2022); Dresses Without Women, Mickey, Chicago (2021); P**** B**** ARENA, Et al., San Francisco (2020, curated by Good Weather); From The Desk of Lucy Bull, Los Angeles (2020); and I’m a Cliche, Prairie, Chicago (2017). Recent group exhibitions include A Prose By Any Other Name, Hans Goodrich, Chicago, IL (2025); My

Story Gallery, High Art & Sister, Seoul, KR (2024); Artists Space, New York, NY (2024); Descending the Staircase, Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, IL (2023); Multi-User Dungeon (MUD), Petzel, New York, NY (2024, curated by Simon Denny); and Tell Me What You Want, Bel Ami, Los Angeles, CA (2023).

McGuire uses open-source technologies, readymades, and popular media references to investigate contemporary shifts in American culture while taking steps to expand on questions traditionally explored through sculpture. With a focus on myths and cultural figures that persist and reappear over time, McGuire implements strategies from gaming culture (such as “kitbashing” and “modding”), prop making, open-source robotics, and art history to breathe new uncanny life into the familiar. McGuire navigates the mutability of the symbolic by engaging with culturally monumental signifiers in ways that feel humorous, unpredictable, and, at times, haunting—ultimately presenting a project intent on forging new possibilities and spiraling pathways.