San Francisco–based curator and author Jordan Stein introduces his new book, published by Pre-Echo Press, Miyoko Ito: Heart of Hearts—the first-ever monograph on the life and work of the Berkeley-born artist (1918–1983). Recently featured on the New York Times Best Art Books of 2023 list, Jason Farago wrote about Heart of Hearts: “A major book for a ‘minor’ (by which I mean major) painter, this striking and sizable volume at last assembles all of Ito’s quiet, adroit abstractions whose genius is no longer a Midwestern secret.” While Ito’s lush and mysterious paintings were scarcely known outside her adopted home of Chicago, she was celebrated with a MATRIX exhibition that Stein guest curated at BAMPFA in 2017, and her work is currently on view in What Has Been and What Could Be. Claire Frost, BAMPFA Curatorial Associate, will join Stein in conversation.

Jordan Stein is also the author of Rip Tales: Jay DeFeo’s Estocada & Other Pieces. In 2017 he founded Cushion Works, an exhibition space in the Mission District dedicated to the presentation of critical and often overlooked artworks, histories, and ideas. He has independently organized exhibitions at venues such as Artists Space, Yale Union, San Francisco City Hall, The Glass House, Matthew Marks Gallery, Fraenkel Gallery, and The Renaissance Society at the University of Chicago, where he formerly served as Curator of Special Projects, as well as BAMPFA. From 2016 to 2022, he was a curator at KADIST, San Francisco.