On View in the Felicity R. “Bebe” Benoliel Gallery

Good Guy With A Gun. 2022. 18 x 24 inches. Gouache, acrylic, tears, charcoal, potato chip bag, Chinese takeout container, & ink on bristol board.

It's Not A Lie If You Believe It: Works by Yikui (Coy) Gu

On View April 17-May 23, 2025

Public Gallery Hours: Tuesday-Friday, 12-6 PM

Artist Reception: April 24, 5-7 PM at CFEVA (237 S 18th St. #3a, Philadelphia PA 19103). RSVP here.

Shop the exhibition here.

It's Not A Lie If You Believe It is a solo exhibit by CFEVA Visual Arts Fellow Yikui (Coy) Gu. This exhibit explores the relationship between several bodies of work completed by Gu in recent years. The works are informed by Gu's identity, as well as varied interests in our relationship to technology and their prevalence in our lives, internet culture, the planned obsolescence of our devices, and what it means to be a painter in the age of the moving image. By turning the Felicity R. “Bebe” Benoliel Gallery into an inhabited space, reconnecting it to its previous use as an apartment, the exhibit blurs the line between art objects versus the everyday, recontextualizing their meaning and significance.

Yikui (Coy) Gu was born in 1983 in Nantong, China and emigrated to the United States at the age of seven, growing up in Albany, NY. He has a BFA from Long Island University and a MFA from the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts.

He has exhibited his work nationally in New York, Miami, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., and Boston; and internationally in London, Berlin, and Siena, Italy. He has been an artist in residence at the School of Visual Arts, and has lectured at Columbia University, Tyler School of Art, Alfred University, and Gettysburg College. He has been reviewed in Hyperallergic, the Washington Post, KunstForum International, the Philadelphia Inquirer, Denver Art Review, and the Yale Daily News. His work has appeared on the cover of the Lower East Side Review, and in Fresh Paint and Art Maze. His work is held in the permanent collections of the Siena Art Institute, Alfred University, Wheaton College, and numerous private collections.

He resides in Philadelphia and teaches at the College of Southern Maryland. The bulk of his time is spent in the studio, where he is currently plotting his takeover of the international art world, while remaining mostly harmless.