SHARI WASSON
STATEMENT

Formed of an elemental language of white voids, atmospheric smudges, and wave-like disturbances, this recent body of work hovers delicately at the threshold of generation and dissolution. At a distance, amorphous nebulae appear to float and drift in circular white formats that tacitly recall bubbles, cells, petri dishes, or radar screens. Up close, graphite and chalk pastel renderings of diminutive tides and currents swirl into view. Topographical viewpoints and occasional red dots evoke a sense of the cartographic, creating a subtle oscillation between object and narrative, map and landscape. The texture of the gallery walls hazily emerges through the pieces’ translucent duralar surfaces, softly blending and merging with the drawn imagery.

At once form and formless, benign and cataclysmic, miniature and grand, these images hint at duality and paradox. Integration within the domestic architecture of HAUS furthers this paradoxical play, as solid walls become fluid, and the intimate, private space of the home becomes host to galaxies of purling lakes, roiling currents, and pulsing tides. Inspired by the search for the self within the constancy of the ‘now,’ and the ever-shifting flow of circumstances, the works stand in a metaphoric relationship to states of being and becoming. As such, they address the fixed indeterminacy that characterizes our existence, both collectively and as individuals. Ultimately, it is my hope that the work communicates a kind of ‘intimate sublime,’ and the quietly resonant undercurrent of grace held in tension that ripples through the human condition.