TERRAIN

Hemmings Gallery is pleased to present TERRAIN, a group exhibition that explores the idea of the artist as navigator of both external and internal landscapes with an openness to discovery and learning. TERRAIN seeks to go beyond the surface-level elements of the artist's work and delve into what lies beneath, to highlight the journey the artist undertakes to gain new insights into themselves and their work. Featured artists include:

FRANCES ASHFORTH:

Frances Ashforth’s spare paintings, drawings and monotypes reflect the geography and geology of intersecting habitats that she has visited and studied. She often orients her compositions along a strong horizon line, exploring its relationships within land, water and sky. Her work can appear deceptively simple yet by focusing on the details and editing the composition, Ashforth’s work evokes memory and knowledge that can only evolve from the focused study of a particular landscape. "Our landscape defines us... My hope is that my work, my simple memories on paper, will help instill the desire to respect and remember what the land continues to give us in all its variety, grit and beauty."

JAN FREEMAN LONG:

Throughout her work, Jan Freeman Long's artistic pursuit remains the same: "I am interested in the mysterious nature of what endures, both within an internal landscape and what surrounds us in the natural world." As a student of painting at the California College of the Arts (CCA), Long was quickly attracted to working with abstraction. Today the fascination remains, "I am interested in visual relationships that express what I don't have the words for-- a territory that is enigmatic, open for exploration-- that is my form of visual poetry." The gallery will feature both her larger works on canvas alongside smaller collage pieces from her Signpost series. 

HALLIE MAXWELL:

Hallie Maxwell is a Japanese American interdisciplinary artist based in Idaho and current resident at the James Castle house in Boise. A descendant of survivors of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, Maxwell's work studies themes such as generational trauma, loss, and disconnection from cultural identity. A recipient of the International Sculpture Center’s 2023 Outstanding Student Achievement in Contemporary Sculpture Award, Maxwell's mizuhiki cord sculptures feature numerous hand-tied awaji knots-- a traditional symbol of the wish to be tied to someone forever. For Maxwell, "My work tends to be very repetitive so I'm really interested in how by making something over and over again, you are connecting to tradition."

ADAM SHAW:

Hemmings Gallery will feature a selection of Shaw's oil paintings from his "I Stood Still and Was A Tree" series. Shaw's thick textured, heavily layered canvases reveal time spent building the work, adding & subtracting materials over long stretches. "As a contemporary artist I dance between these two poles, striving to create the artifice of immediacy, urgency, but with surfaces built up and broken down often over the course of years, or even decades. So the painting feels like it 'just happened' or is 'happening now' yet the surface reveals layers of history, construction, destruction and repetition."