Christine Sefolosha, Véloce, 2015, Ink, mixed media, chine collé on Arches paper, 40 x 58 inches, 101.6 x 147.3 cm, CSe 108
SPIRITED WOMEN: DRAWING DOWN FIRE
OCTOBER 17 - NOVEMBER 28, 2015
Bessie Harvey was a conjure woman who expressed important spiritual aspects of her culture in compelling and dangerous totemic figures. Amalia is a shamaness among the small Seri Indian group on the Sea of Cortez in Northern Mexico. Anna Zemánková made intense and convoluted drawings of organisms never before seen on Earth. Solange Knopf makes incantatory drawings of a mythical psyche in order to heal and balance her as well as others. Ojibway artist Dawn Walden pushes the envelope of contemporary basketry by observing the way certain birds in the forests around her home obsessively line and weave their nests perpetuating a form of nature-driven sculpture. The paintings of Christine Sefolosha convey a language of dream informed by her African and Swiss residencies, a visual poetry that is completely unstuck in time. Semone Robinson says she considers all of her art to be a spiritual gift from God.
These are only some of the stories in Spirited Women: Drawing Down Fire, an homage to some of the visionary artists showing at Cavin-Morris Gallery.
The women are artists who work away from the blaring racket of the mainstream, with art that is very personal in intention, using it as a language to communicate with the non-material world, whether through trance, mediumship, visions, out of body experiences, or religious ecstasy. For each artist, making this work was and is a process of survival inseparable from daily life. These are women lit by strong individual creative fires.