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Allegory is used extensively in art history - from Jacques-Louis David's and Francisco Goya's depictions of the traumas of war, to more contemporary work like Eleanor Antin's photography series, The Last Days of Pompeii. The artists in It's All Personal use allegory to tell their own stories, dealing with memory and personal issues, such as, fear, abandonment, and body dysmorphia. This grounds the work firmly in the contemporary.
In her series, Corporeal Tangents, Arhia Kohlmoos employees graphite drawing and uses her physical form to describe the discomfort of body image issues and the different ways she psychologically manages those challenges. These carefully rendered figures are intimate and vulnerable.
Heather La Force's mixed media large scale collage, You’re Enough to Try the Patience of a Saint, comprised of fragments from the artist's drawings and prints, uses humor to address the overwhelming nature of contemporary culture and the human condition.
Daisy Patton's painting series, Forgetting is so long, incorporates abandoned and found family photographs in order to convey a sense of remembrance of these otherwise forgotten people. Taking into consideration the relationship between painting and photography and their relationship to time – photography/death, painting/elongation of time – the people in these paintings have an extended life through their image, yet they exist in a limbo state.
Using visual storytelling, symbolism, and personal histories, the three artists in It’s All Personal provoke a conversation about life in contemporary US society.
Image credit: Arhia Kohlmoos, Self Portrait as a Beautiful Lady, graphite on paper, 12 x 9", 2012
Gallery exhibitions are FREE and open to the public. Exhibition runs September 11 - October 23. Opening Reception: Friday, September 11, 5-7 p.m. Gallery hours: M-F 10-6. Closed October 12.
