THE FOCUS

Jennifer Pepper combines handwriting, plant life, and recycled beekeeping equipment to create mixed media artworks and installations that seek to express the arcane beauty of standardized systems, such as that of the wooden Langstroth beehive and handwriting. The visual poetry of geometric forms (like the bee cell, the honeycomb frame, etc.), are repeated, written, drawn, or sculpted in increments lending themselves to subtle changes that create intricacies and can become compelling as form. Jennifer Pepper, Studio Visit, 2021 Jennifer Pepper, Studio...

"The history and experiences of Southern Post Removal era Native Americans, mixed-blood African and European Americans, and immigrants have faded into time and lay in the pages of dusty unopened archives, the minds of their descendants, the edge of the latter’s psyches, often forgotten altogether. When one thinks of the South, these people do not come to mind. It is generally perceived and assumed that the South exists only in Black and White, metaphorically, and “racially”. The narrative that I pres...

"If the body is a house and a body has memory, then so must the house and the shelf and the door." Tracy Treadwell, Fawn on the Water, 2020 (76” x 146” x 26”) painted corrugated tin, steel, pine, polyform boat fender "Peel back the suburban lipstick of my upbringing and you’ll find layers of quiet, familial dysfunction. On the same day, I could ride my bike down to the woods, where I built poorly made sanctuaries out of whatever debris I found littered...

"I come from gardeners, teachers, believers, sinners, moon-lighting loggers, makers, milliners, cooks, healers, pharmacists, and grocers. I come from the American South, a place where the kitchen and pharmacy are the same room. In many ways, I see my work as that same room—an expansive space for building and coming together." Jodi Hays, Virtual Studio Visit, March 2021 (images courtesy of the artist and Sam Angel Photography) Jodi Hays, Iris, 40" x 25" (2021), dye, oil, canvas ribbon, paper (images courtesy of...

“Sequestration Still-Lifes and Other Scenes from the Plaza consists of a body of metaphorical paintings that tackle the still life as a subject. The paintings, done under quarantine, cover the ideas of domestic claustrophobia, vice, and the political and medical misgivings of our country from the months of February to August 2020. These paintings draw from a span of historical influences, which include Dutch memento mori, synthetic cubism, and pop art.” Jason Stout, Peach Heart Window and the Wizard of Oz, 2020, 30" x 30...

"I’m currently preparing for a solo exhibit titled “Rocks Cry Out” at Southern Adventist University. It was originally scheduled for October, but has now been postponed to January. The extra time has been a gift, allowing me to move more slowly and deeply into research and painting. The ground at our feet has been a witness to the land and its people since the very beginning. My goal is to listen to its stories and learn from those who teach...

"I explore the concept of landscape as medium, rather than subject. Depicting strange, desolate environments and sublime forces, my work references the abstracted, altered land of our world while shifting outwards towards a science fictional realm. Sculptural landscapes composed of industrial references, geological formations, and mutable material accumulate into form, while emanating an energy of transformation and process. Elemental models, miniatures, and depictions of alternative ground are found in the balance of presence and absence, creation and destruction, artificial and...

"For the past ten years I have been playing with how the eye filters what the mind perceives as spacial depth. I use slight temperature/tonal shifts, varying mark-making gestures, and different paint finishes that demonstrate Gestaltism in my practice. Gestaltism is a psychological theory postulating that the mind uses negative space, shape association, and tonal cues to dictate depth and meaning through vision. My goal with this present body of work is to experiment with what is necessary for...