"Best Friend of Man," Mary Chiaramonte

From my Inbox to you:

What’s Inside?
An exhibition curated by Susan Jamison
Virginia Tech Carillion School of Medicine
September 20-December 20, 2012
Opening reception September 20 5:30-8:30

Artists:
Lauren Levato, Chicago, IL
Rachel Bernstein, New York, NY
Fiona Ross, Richmond, VA
Jennifer Anderson, Roanoke, VA
Mary Chiaramonte, Richmond, VA
Gerry Bannan, Roanoke, VA
Tif Robinette, Roanoke, VA
Ben Osmann, Roanoke, VA

What’s Inside our bodies? Each of the artists chosen for this exhibition seeks to explore and reveal this question through their work in ways that present intentions beyond what contemporary anatomy illustration is designed to accomplish in it’s presentation of factual information.

"Sensate," Jennifer Anderson

Lauren Levato and Gerry Bannan both work in an exquisitely rendered, detailed style crafting drawings and paintings that bind human parts with insects, plants, hints of decay and symbolism. A more abstracted and darkly playful side of our interiors is contemplated in the works of Rachel Bernstein, Fiona Ross and Tif Robinette who’s forms are reminiscent of guts, viruses and tumors that become animated or grotesque in their character. Jennifer Anderson’s delicately crafted and layered lacy prints of body structures fuse back together what was once dissected with painstaking attention to process and detail. With similar attention and sensitivity to detail, Ben Osmann references the body and entices memory through assembling found objects in combination with painting in a way that is open and organic and yet resists concrete interpretations. Just as memory is an invisible part of what is inside of us, so is spirit, palatably seen in the narrative paintings of Mary Chiaramonte that echo provocative daydreams and something unseen inside the human disposition. Whether through precise detail and structure, by depicting the boldly grotesque and distorted, through narrative and symbolism, or by evoking fragments of memory, these artists reveal their respective impressions of what is seen and unseen inside of us.