Gallery Artists: Jennifer Moses

When as a student I first saw the panel paintings of pre renaissance Siena, my work and my ideas about painting changed permanently. The emotion, and imagery, (often bloody and violent) which exists in this work, contrasted with the visual beauty of the painting object is a tension I struggle to achieve in my own work. I experienced these pieces in a purely emotional way, and felt compelled to reconcile the skepticism of a modern formalist education with the emotional power of narrative drama. Since then, I have worked to integrate my responses to the history and narrative of biblical stories with my contemporary secular aesthetic in an attempt to imbue the combination of representative and non representational imagery with the same emotive weight of storytelling.

In the newest paintings I’m extracting decorative elements and of elaborate renaissance hairstyles from other paintings and from my imagination. As I rework the paintings I am attempting to transform the hair-dos into symbolic images that evoke a range of emotional conditions and complex space. Scraped and varied paint surfaces allow my work to be both intimate and raw at the same time. I build swirling hair-like strokes into odd iconographic formations and architectural spaces that reference an internal world full of oppositions such as structured form and unraveling form, rawness and refinement, exposure and secrecy.

Ms. Moses is a professor at the University of New Hampshire. She has exhibited her work throughout New England since 1988 and is also represented by the Clark Gallery in Lincoln Massachusetts.

Cradle, 2008 [Courtesy of the Clark Gallery]
materials: oil on wood panel
dimensions: 24" x 22"

Drape, 2008 [Courtesy of the Clark Gallery]
materials: oil on wood panel
dimensions: 24" x 22"

Greek Tragedy, 2008 [Courtesy of the Clark Gallery]
materials: oil on wood panel
dimensions: 24" x 22"

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