Phases Virtual Exhibition
Curated by Jean Nagai and Benz Amataya
Exhibiting artists were invited to add commentaries to their art as a way to connect deeper with the virtual audience.
We encourage you to take your time viewing each piece and reading the artists’ words.
(The commentaries are underneath each piece).
Maja Skjoth Hegelund
Drowning, 28 seconds
Current phase of mental health
“Socially challenged and exhausted”
Rose Silberman-Gorn
Feels Like Home, 2020, 9.75”x5.5”x3”, polymer clay, acrylic paint, and sculpey glaze
“My sculpture “Feels like Home” is a symbolic representation of the repressed fear and dread that I felt growing up in a home with a narcissistic mother. I wanted to display how significant places can be so imbued with memories and feelings that they become practically sentient, while exploring my traumatic upbringing from an adult perspective.”
Jasmine Zelaya
Self- Portrait with Vibrations, 22” x 30”
Current phase of mental health
“Existing”
Larissa Martin
a space for unfolding, 297 x 420 mm
“I'm interested in exploring states of mind/emotions/energetic impressions and sensations in my work. This exploration also can help me get more curious about what I'm feeling which helps me to cultivate witnessing the life unfolding within consciousness. Story books, cartoons, comics and coloring books have influenced what I do as well, as I'm interested in how stories, culteral and personal, influence our psyches and identities.”
Dana Burns
Self Portrait with Ninon, 2021, Oil, acrylic, marker, faux fur & howlite gemstones on linen, 55 x 38 cm
“I have recently found a voice and strength in expressing my own internal journey via self-portraiture. I think that this has to do with what I have been working through via self-help pursuits, combined with getting close to my mid-thirties. Being isolated for an entire year now during this pandemic has expanded this journey, as well as having removed various external distractions (thus from being pulled back into painting landscapes and/or urban scenes).
This work is part of an ongoing series that is opening a door to a new way of expressing myself through art.”
Maria Dusamp
Stay still I, 5 x 7.5 x 1.06 (in)
“These works examine fabrics' sensuality and their capacity to exhibit histories that cling to the body or that encase a place of body intervention. Intimacy and intrusion toggle in the cracks and valleys of the work's surface and in hints of the female figure. These works aim to shatter an illusion of softness and malleability while resisting unwarranted attention and touch, placing the viewer in a power dynamic between themselves and the object's passivity.”
Ene Bissenbakker
60x60 cm. Gouache on paper mounted on wooden board.
“In this series I ask myself: what are memories and how are we as humans attached to them? How is it possible to make visual representations of something that only appears as deeply personal impressions in the mind? How does one work in a dialectic process with the painting to understand the significance of memory?”
Rachel Simkover
Untitled 2- 22" x 31"
“I arrive at each new weaving with the desire to create something vastly different from the previous project to prevent apathy and burnout, and the first step is choosing materials. The challenge I assigned myself with this tapestry was to use an assortment of blended, earth-tone wool, which is a departure from the solid, bright colors that I usually gravitate towards. I work intuitively and let the colors guide the development of the piece.”
Alicia Ethridge
Stretched Thin in Shark Infested Water, collage on paper, 8" x 10"
“The beauty and chaos of living during a pandemic has had a significant impact on my mental well being. These works contemplate how to maintain hope in the face of fragility, death and battered dreams.”
Laila Pathan
I Dreamed I Threw a Brick Through a Window 24" x 36" 2020 Oil on Canvas
"I stumbled around the top of my manic mountain for eight interminable weeks, collecting bunches of stimuli, looking for mouths to devour my heart and stretching my body until I couldn't see it anymore. I ignored the altitude sickness because I was immortal. Once my limbs snapped back into place I noticed shards of fuselage clinging to my body after all the planes I crashed into others. Their noise coated my body like a cold sweat. Rather than open up a window for air, I broke it and let the glass shear off my body what wasn't mine."
Erika B Hess
Reflections on Drowning 3, oil on panel, 48"x36" 2021
“Before having PPD (Post Partum Depression) my work was filled with saturated hot color. I loved the feeling I had when I used it or looked at it. I attempted to keep using this type of color as I struggled with PPD and hit a point where I couldn't do it anymore. I felt like I was drowning and the color felt too big, too intense, too much. I had an image flash into my mind of being below the water and ended up painting it. I used a muted, more earthly palette that communicated what I was feeling and what I think many people may be feeling as we deal with the pandemic.”
Julia Karl
Sculptural Hatching no.8 / 40cm x 40cm, Acrylic paint and modelling paste on canvas, 2020
"The artwork displayed here is part of an ongoing series called 'Sculptural Hatching'. The series originated during the London lockdown 2020 when I was trapped inside my flat and looking for a way to deal with the stress, anxiety and loneliness caused by COVID-19.”
Robert Zurer
Exchange of Substances 60" x 60"
“The human condition is very unique and strange in that we belong to two different worlds. Our feet are on the ground but our eyes may gaze at the stars. In the Mevlevi Order, the dervish whirls with one palm facing up to receive grace from above and with the other facing down to give what is received to the world.”
Marantz Moon
Afro Figure 9x10 inches.
“Upon the start of covid 19 in March of 2020 I was completely lost and confused, overtime I leaned into my emotions and found strength in creating and allowed that to guide me down the path of resilience and optimism.”
Dominyka Obelenyte
Entity: 2020, Mixed media on paper, 6 x 8 ft;
“Entity is a cross-section of my understanding of myself: the artist as a human, the artist as a part of all matter, and the artist as a simple component in the Samsaric wheel of life. To me it answers the questions, where are we going, and where have we been?”
Amber Larks
Cicadas and Calamites, 30"x40"
"I have always been fascinated by statues because of their longevity and because in some way, they connect us to people from the past. Seeing art from the past makes me realize that although times change, the human condition remains unchanged. I made this piece to personify the human condition transcending time and exploring what it means to be human.”
Melody Overstreet
Celestial Drift, 24"H x 18"W
“This piece is titled Celestial Drift and is a collagraph print made in a simultaneously additive and subtractive way with seeds, plant dust, sandpaper, an awl, and a rusty saw. My conceptual approach to this piece was to evidence change in an earthy and celestial way, and remember that however magical, mundane, or difficult things are in a given moment, that everything is subject to constant change. My recent work has been to practice less attachment and appreciate the small moments of wonder that exist alongside everything else.”
Krista Dedrick-Lai
I'm Fine: 18" x 24”, acrylic on canvas, 2021
“My experiences with bipolar disorder have often left me grappling with what feels like an intense, alternate reality that no one else can see. My identity, behavior and self perception shift and change with my mood and mental state in ways that are impossible to convey. Mixed episodes leave me feeling like I may burst apart, as I desperately grope for some sort of stability.”
Jesse Moy
Diagonals, ink on paper, 9 x 6 in each, 2020
Marrin Lee Martinez
Low Tide 4:42 PM, 32" x 60"
“My mental health has always been tethered to a 28-day micro-loop of phases. I have PMDD (Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder) and I typically follow small rituals that help cushion the blow of dramatic mood swings throughout each month. With the pandemic isolation and a series of meltdowns, I reluctantly began taking anti-depressants. I am so grateful that I did. With my breakdown, came tremendous breakthroughs in both mothering and my art practice. I am now bursting with new ideas and curiosities. I am less affected by uncontrollable forces.”
Sarah Sudhoff
How Does It Feel was created using data from the vibrator
Current phase of mental health
“Making myself a priority, leaving toxic relationship and practicing self-care and meditation.”
Andrea Castillo
Starfish (after Man Ray), 12x16 inches, Oil and Wax on Paper, 2021
“This piece is a nod to Man Ray's 1928 film Starfish (L'Étoile de mer), I am attempting to rediscover the female bodily form from the character in the film. She is placed in a hallucinogenic dreamlike state much like in the film. I am interpreting this daydreaming state as a place of ease, a welcoming state that can be vital for mental health.”
Elizabeth Marmur
MUSE: 16.5x11.7ins
“MUSE is a self portrait of the creative force within; the force that takes over when we allow ourselves to surrender to the creative process. She isn’t me as I see myself in the flesh as much as how I experience myself in the spirit - powerful, direct and expansive - like creativity itself.”
Christian DeFillippo
Hands 16" x 20"
“I like to figure out my paintings as I go along. Usually they’ll be drawings and color samples laying around in my studio. It gets moved around and eventually new combinations are formed. If they stand out I’ll try committing them to paper or canvas. The discovery process keeps me going. Especially during the pandemic it’s been so grounding to have all the random things I’ve accumulated in my studio to focus on and draw inspiration from.”
Hannah Leighton
City Sneeze, 72x72 inches. Yarn on monk's cloth.
“Last spring I entered into the anxiety phase, and I'm afraid little has changed. It is an everyday struggle to keep looming anxieties at bay.”
Erickson Diaz
Violetita, 4.5" x 6"
“Drawing from my own memory and experience, my work depicts tender scenes of everyday queer life. These scenes reveal intimate moments of romance, compassion, and self-discovery. My most recent body of work depicts objects and flowers in elusive, impressionistic fields. Acidic colors and vivid lighting intensify these otherwise mundane, domestic objects, highlighting their importance and sentimentality. My drawings investigate the ways in which queerness transcends sexual experience and resolves itself through color, form, and figuration.”
Melissa Murray
Origins, 30in x 28in
“We breathe in, We breathe out is a new series of works on paper realized through two separate lines of inquiry; large paintings that represent consecutive moments in a timeline and a series of small works that capture singular, psychological moments throughout the day. The work is about making new spaces where there is no room, facing death while creating life, losing yourself through transformation. They are about fear and the unknown.”
Annie King
Headspace no. 2, 2021
Video collage using stock video and original audio.
“Inhale nature, the freshwater breeze, the petrichor of wet earth, the intoxication of cool winter air, exhale nature. Repeat.
Nature has always been my go-to mental health helper. I am blessed to live in a part of the world with abundant fresh water and forests, and my family and I take full advantage of it. The Headspace series tries to pull on those sensations I get while in nature, and acts as a device to bring me back when I cannot. Although based on my own experiences, I hope the work is universal, allowing any viewer a moment to settle their breathe and calm their mind.”