Whitespace artist, Sarah Emerson, sure has been busy! Not only is the opening reception for her current show at whitespace tonight from 7-10 pm but she was recently interviewed on Burnaway’s ARTSpeak Radio , is featured in this month’s Jezebel magazine and has been selected by world renowned art critic, David Hickey, for the 18th Annual Texas National Competition and Exhibition taking place at SFA Galleries in Nacogdoches, Texas April 14 thru May 26.

“Underland” new paintings by Sarah Emerson

Sarah Emerson’s paintings present viewers with highly stylized versions of nature by taking patterns already visible in the natural world and painting them in pastel hues and pop, paint by number repetition. Inspired by themes ranging from battlefields, war propaganda, literature, and idyllic gardens, she uses the landscape for impression, abstraction, symbolism, and sentiment. Emerson manipulates scale and spatial relationships, twisting her subjects into flat emblems and shifting planes.  The result is often visually enchanting compositions that combine candy-like colors with macabre narratives that leave the viewer with a sense of both wonder and melancholy.

"Darkness Falls," acrylic and rhinestones on canvas, 48 x 60"

For Underland, Emerson’s second solo exhibition at whitespace gallery, she focuses on creating a series of underworld reflections of the natural landscape.  Each painting depicts a fantastical analogical study of an actual place combined with the myths and remnants of the real events associated with that location.  Once on canvas the place is removed from reality; it becomes an image reflection or vague memory filtered, abstracted, and compressed into geometric shapes.  For Emerson, the artificial underworld in her paintings becomes a story of its own, an apocryphal place mimicking and appropriating a reality of paradise and innocence lost.  Each painting is a parallel plane with repeating symbols and “memento mori” motifs dressed up to camouflage a gaping darkness lurking beneath the surface.

Sarah Emerson graduated from the Atlanta College of Art and went on to complete a Master’s Degree at Goldsmiths College in London, England. Over the last twelve years she has exhibited her paintings in galleries throughout the United States, Canada, and Europe, including White Columns in New York, Cosmic Gallery in Paris, and Real Art Ways in Connecticut.  Her paintings were featured on the cover of New American Paintings in 2003 and 2007; and her current work will be included in the upcoming Southern edition of New American Paintings 2012.  In 2010, Emerson exhibited her work in “Catastrophe,” the Quebec City Biennial curated by Sylvie Fortin.  Other recent projects include murals for the Atlanta Contemporary Art Center’s Day Job: Georgia group show and the City of Atlanta Office of Cultural Affairs’ Elevate/Art Above Underground Atlanta public art project.    Her work was also included in Atlanta Art Now’s inaugural publication, Noplaceness: Art in a Post-Urban Landscape.

“Underland” will run from April 5 – May 12, 2012

whitespace gallery hours: Wed – Sat | 11 am – 5 pm or by appointment

814 Edgewood Avenue | Atlanta GA 30307 | Tel: 404.688.1892

Guests gathered at whitespace on Wednesday evening for a conversation with artist, Tommy Taylor. Taylor’s recent show Some Sort of Solitude was inspired by a trip he took through the North Carolina mountains and the book, A Short History of Myth. Taylor began thinking about more instinctual parts that form our experiences and attempted to paint the unexplainable. Throughout the work, Taylor depicts images from his childhood, a time when things seemed much grander, and calls the paintings “visual puzzles”. Painting through the eyes of an inner-child, Taylor explores ideas of heroes and what it means to be a man.

Popeye and Bluto appear in two of his paintings. Taylor thinks of Popeye as an exemplary of a hero and shows Popeye and Bluto as one figure, a Yin and Yang of sorts.

"Ledo Road" features multiple images that symbolize members of the artist's family. The seated woman is a representation of Taylor's aunt whom he remembers telling stories of Brer Rabbit, depicted in the left hand corner. The young boy, or the artist's great uncle, was a war-time pilot. Ledo Road, the only road accessible to soldiers, was used as a supply route. The painting also depicts an image from German propaganda conveying the country's dark past.