January 9- February 7, 2021
Opening Saturday January 9th, 12-9pm, regular hours from there-on Saturdays & Sundays 12-5pm
Room 1:
3 sets of 10, 48 x 72 inches, Oil on panel, 2020
7, 36 x 48 inches, Oil on panel, 2020
soft tissue, 30 x 40 inches, Oil on panel, 2020
Ann Haley
GOOD BAD POSTURE
This body of work is a map of my healing process through chronic pain and trauma from an accident with a semi-truck in 2015. Distilling the human form down to the ligaments and bones, while going through the repetitive motions of physical therapy, I am building layers of paint to write my body’s topography, working each painting as I work my body through a different stage of healing.
The marks I make delineate a space for the collision itself and the PTSD that came with it, the time spent in bed, listening to doctors, in surgery, in bandages and braces, doing exercises and stretches, the metal that is now fused to my cervical spine, and the pain that never really went away. But also a space for the body’s remarkable ability to strengthen, to grow and to heal.
I began this process believing that healing means to be fixed; to be like before; a linear journey from broken to whole. Through my own cyclical process of growth and strain, I know that healing is not an erasure or extraction of what is hurting you, but the creation of spaces for holding that hurt, confronting it, wrestling it and loving yourself through it. These works investigate the liminal space that exists between one’s ability to cope and heal from trauma and one’s ability to accept and transcend pain.
Ann Haley (Atlanta, GA, b. 1991) received a BFA in Painting from the Savannah College of Art and Design in Savannah, GA in 2014. She has exhibited her work internationally in solo and group exhibitions in Lacoste, France, Savannah, GA, Gainesville, GA and New Orleans, LA. Haley has resided in New Orleans, LA since 2014, working as a Teaching Artist and is currently a gallery member at The Front.
annhaleystudio.com
@annhaleystudio
https://vimeo.com/497873427
Room 2:
Erica Christmas
Pelusa
What would it look like if Black and Brown people were free? How would that freedom look? Would it inspire a rally cry?
In Pelusa, Erica Christmas asks these questions through her portraits. Born in Connecticut and raised in Geneva, NY- Erica has felt “othered” her whole life. With Pelusa, Erica is able to create her own idea of representation and liberation, even if only for a month. Showing photographs from 2011- Present Day, Pelusa is an exhibition showcasing Erica’s work for the first time. In the center of the gallery lies white roses encased in resin. Half installation and half ancestral, Erica gives thanks and literal roses to those who have gone and to those who are still here.
I’ve always been drawn to portraiture as a way to reflect myself and to create imagery that was always lacking throughout my childhood and adult life of Black people. As a black woman, representation is important but so is intent. My portraiture aims views black and brown people tenderly while in a “regular” environment.
Rooms 3 & 4:
Shannon Stewart
Involuntary Park
Involuntary Park is an installation and performance made in collaboration with Iris McCloughan, Jeff Becker, Adam Sekuler, Jen Davis and the landscape known as the Hanford Reach.
Scheduled visits can be arranged through
www.shannonstewart.org/involuntary-park
Running time approx 15 minutes.
Shannon Stewart holds an MFA in Interdisciplinary Dance Performance from Tulane University and a BA in Urban Design from the University of Washington. Her work explores the intersection of dance with embodied identities, somatic archives, and social choregraphies. She works across and through disciplines but her creative practice is body-centered, understanding that change, healing, and connectedness on both an individual and collective level must consider and confront what the body holds.
Shannon’s work has been presented nationally and internationally in theaters, galleries, and on screens. Her last work RELATIVES was nominated for Outstanding Choreography by the Big Easy Classical Arts Awards and invited to the Victoria and Albert Gallery in London. She curates and produces the BE / WITH improvisation series and the FUTURE OCEANS Festival showcasing emerging international voices. As a performer in galleries, she has interpreted the work of Deborah Hay, Joan Jonas, and Tino Seghal among others.
shannonstewart.org
@thesurrealshannonstewart
https://vimeo.com/user316311