There’s a box they don’t tell you about

Jessica Zawadowicz & Yaismel Alba Garib

PATIENT INFO

6/6-7/13/2025

Kindling and tinder outside, wax and wicks within. Was a worry, then a stain, now a drain on what we’ve forgotten about what has changed us. One plays, the other solar flares. Short intensities, whipping winds of light and heat across incomprehensible distances. The big one, bridging disasters, unimaginable in another era. Pre-digital communications and infrastructure. On the other bank, a forced device detox. Crippling winds, collapsing power grids. Darkness is the final natural order. Stockpiles of candles are now worth more than their weight. The flame’s flicker breathes a new world just as fragile as the last. Two people stand and wonder who’s got the box? 

Jessica Zawadowicz is an artist based in Chicago, IL, whose practice is grounded within painting, collage, improvisation, and sport playing. She received an MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, a BFA from The University of the Arts, and has attended the Skowhegan School of Painting & Sculpture. Her work has been exhibited at Free Range (Chicago, IL), Weatherproof (Chicago, IL), Ivory Gate Gallery (Chicago, IL), Color Club (Chicago, IL), Atelier Gallery (Philadelphia, PA), Ortega Y Gasset Projects (Brooklyn, NY), PII Gallery (Philadelphia, PA), amongst others. She is a current Lecturer in the Painting & Drawing department at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and also works with kids. 

Yaismel Alba Garib is a Cuban-born artist based in Chicago. His work spans performance and painting, exploring themes of memory, identity, and embodied resistance. Alba Garib earned an MFA in Performance from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (2022) and a BFA in Theater Studies from the University of Arts, ISA, in Havana, Cuba (2015). Garib’s work has been presented in solo and group exhibitions across the U.S. and Cuba, including WOW YEAH at Comfort Station (Chicago, 2024), Dance This Mess Around at Patient Info (Chicago, 2024), and El acto de destrucción es un acto de salvación at the XIII Havana Biennial (2019). Prior to relocating to the U.S., Alba Garib was active as a writer and editor for prominent Cuban arts publications and served as director of De magazine at the Scenic Design Studies Center (CEDE) in Havana. Alba Garib continues to engage in politically conscious, body-centered art-making that navigates between personal narrative and collective history.