Steve Seeley

Painter and printmaker Steve Seeley mines the breadth of 20th-century geek culture to create a brand of 21st-century slapstick surrealism uniquely and entirely his own.

Seeley is a mainstay of Chicago’s contemporary art community. The Wisconsin native came to the city in 2004 after earning a Master of Fine Arts in printmaking from the Ohio State University, appearing in group shows across the Midwest before headlining his earliest solo exhibitions in partnership with Chicago’s Packer Schopf Gallery. Seeley — a former partner in Windy City printmaking specialists POP!NK Editions — first exhibited at Vertical in 2013 as part of the gallery’s very first holiday group show, ‘Deck the Halls,’ and returned in 2015 for ‘Heroes & Villains.’ He has remained a Vertical fixture in the years since, co-headlining 2023’s duo show ‘Love Notes’ opposite Blake Jones, presenting the Jack Kirby-inspired ‘They Cometh!’ at Aqua Art Miami 2024 and returning in 2025 for ‘Right Back at It Again.’