“Dinner Time” by Missy Dahl
Recently re-locating to Chicago from Seattle, artist Missy Dahl will be debuting her paintings in the Windy City with a solo exhibition of work entitled “Memories” at Elephant Room, Inc. February 25th through April 5th, 2013. An opening reception will be held on Friday, March 1st from 7pm to 9pm. Elephant Room, Inc is located at 704 S Wabash Ave. in the South Loop neighborhood of Chicago.
The inspiration for “Memories” comes from the studies of other people’s lives through old photographs Dahl finds. As an artist, Dahl jots down her thoughts in her moleskine in order to provide the inspiration for her next painting. As she moves into this new series of “Memories”, she is able to look through her past notebooks and see how her thoughts took her from one collection to another. Her recent move has given her time to pause and reflect on this process of creating art while developing her fascination of other peoples memories and how they have shaped their own lives. Through this process, she has been able to artistically loosen up her edges, allowing her personal style to shine through her classical painting background. “This series has opened me up to new and exciting styles and taught me through the moments of other peoples lives, the importance of standing still.” – Dahl.
These figurative oil paintings based on vintage portraits, done in black and white, employ brown accent lines and soft earth tones. These ghost-like renderings put an emphasis on glowing whites and smudged, faded backgrounds in order to portray the haunting qualities captured in the facial expressions of the figures in her Memory series. These works are similar to the original photograph in the placement and setting, but Dahl has brought her own style to each piece through her interpretation of the memories and thus, has given a new life to these records of the past.
Missy Dahl received her education from the classical renaissance school, Gage Academy of Art, where she studied under Mark Kang O’Higgins in a drawing and painting atelier program. After graduating, she found success working and living in Seattle, WA where she studied further at Gage Academy, worked out of a private sudio and had more than six solo exhibitions in a span of four years. In 2010, she was chosen to be the sole represented artist in the movie, Nothing Against Life, Julio Ramirez’s first feature film. From 2009 to 2011, Dahl was one of three co-founders of a community collective called the Totem Atelier, which was used to encourage graduating artists to continue their education by assisting one another in their artistic endeavors. Recently moving to Chicago, she looks forward to continuing to create community excitement in the arts and finding a place for her visual understanding to shine.
Website: www.elephantroomgallery.com