Beloved Wichita artists John and Connie Ernatt will unveil a collection of new artworks for the first time locally in over ten years. They plan to host an art opening on October 24th from 6:30 to 10:00 p.m. at the Diver, a studio and gallery space they own at 424 S. Commerce St. in Wichita, KS. After 25 years of marriage, John and Connie are hardly strangers to each other’s creative processes, but this is the first time they will share original work stemming from a fully collaborative effort.

Connie is perhaps best known locally for her bronze sculptures, including the elusive Wichita River troll, the WSU Wushock, and the Sedgwick County Law Enforcement Memorial. She has also been the de facto art director and house artist at Botanica for most of the last decade, overseeing the recently renovated Chinese garden and the Joyland Carousel, a project she and John worked on together. Her individual art often features bronze chimpanzees living out darkly comedic narratives in a world of found objects and oddities.

John has left a major imprint on the Botanica gardens as well; his sculpture “The Attendant, 1923” stands at the entrance to the terrace. He also designed the McAfee Pool gates as part of a public art project for which Connie was hired as a consultant. Perhaps most notably, John is a founding member of the Fisch Haus, an artist collective that played a critical role in the development of the Wichita Arts District on Commerce Street. His enormous abstract paintings, thoughtfully built into custom frames, have been featured in numerous galleries and are the highlight of prestigious collections throughout Wichita and the greater Midwest.

Their new collaborative works are part painting, part sculpture: fourteen monolithic towers that echo each artist’s unique creative voice. John describes how he was enamored with the beauty of collaborative processes, hoping that together they might push the boundaries of creativity confined to a repeated form. Connie was already considering ways to subdue narrative in her own creative process and was excited for the challenge of including representational forms without overwhelming a simplified focus on line, shape, and color. Ultimately, both artists were drawn toward a more intimate collaboration in response to the collective isolation of the pandemic and a more personal shared grief following the death of an inspirational family member.

While aptly titled “The Collaboratives,” this exhibition will also feature individual paintings and sculptures by John and Connie. Their art will be on display at the Diver through the new year with additional public viewings during the first Friday art crawls on November 7th and December 5th. Private showings are also available by request.