Session 1: Traces (the imaginary presence of the absent artist)
Maxine Henryson & Jane Swavely
Memory + Imagination
Monday, March 1, 2021, 8 am EST
Webinar Link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84592197420
Webinar ID: 845 9219 7420
Maxine Henryson. Wisteria “immortality/expanding consciousness”, Boca Sombrero, Costa Rica, 2015 Archival pigment print from film, 34 x 51 inches, Ed. 1/3
Jane Swavely, Jinx, oil on canvas, 2018. 73x 61"
In this lecture, Maxine Henryson and Jane Swavely will discuss the ghost of the artist’s presence in subjective photography and abstract painting. Evidence of their bodily movement in their work: the use of the blur as a space and memory-making gesture in Henryson’s and the brush stroke in Swavely’s. Using their work as a starting point they will elaborate on the context of their individual works within contemporary feminist photography and painting. There is and remains a presence of the artist not just in the mark, but in the choices made drawing upon years of work and observation. There is a history of the painter’s experience not only with materials, but in the world and a life lived. Swavely’s paintings and Henryson’s photography often point to something without actually referring to it, leaving the viewer the opportunity to insert themselves.
Suggested Reading - Maxine Henryson:
Dr. Kathleen Wentrack, “Mary Beth Edelson: Ritual Performances,” The Feminist Institute Digital Exhibit Project, Google Arts & Culture
Imperfections: The work of Julia Margaret Cameron, Google Arts & Culture
April Johnston, “Through the Looking Glass: On Julia Margaret Cameron and Exquisite Imperfection” Artsy.net
Rena Silverman, “Helen Levitt’s Street Photos Blend the Poetic With the Political”
Gernsheim, Helmut. “Julia Margaret Cameron: Her Life”
Kuspit, Donald (1983). "Mary Beth Edelson: An Introduction". Mary Beth Edelson -- New Work: An Ancient Thirst and A Future Vision. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania: The Gallery. OCLC 12207189.
Suggested Reading - Jane Swavely:
Jutta Koether, F, Sternberg Press, 2014
Shirley Kaneda, The Feminine in Abstract Painting,
Isabelle Graw: The Value of Liveliness: Painting as an Index of Agency in the New Economy (Harvard lecture, Painting Beyond Itself, 2013)
Maxine Henryson is a photographer and bookmaker who lives and works in New York. Her photographic practice draws from traditions including painting, film, performance, installation and sculpture. She has a Master of Philosophy from the University of London, a Master of Arts in Teaching from the University of Chicago and a Master of Fine Arts in Photography from the University of Illinois at Chicago. Recent solo exhibitions include True Though Invented, A.I.R. Gallery, New York (2020), Contrapuntal, A.I.R. Gallery, New York (2017), Ujjayi’s Journey, A.I.R. Gallery, New York, Calculated Coincidence, Kleinschmidt Fine Photographs, Wiesbaden (2014). Selected group exhibitions include Women on the Line, Studio 44, Stockholm (2017), Cooperative Consciousness, A.I.R. artists at Kochi-Muziris Biennale, India (2016–17), The Body in Review, ARC Gallery, Chicago (2015), Unscharf. Nach Gerhard Richter, Hamburger Kunsthalle (2011), as well as Lives of the Hudson, Frances Young Tang Teaching Museum and Art Gallery, Skidmore College, Saratoga Springs, New York (2010), and Marvelous Reality/Lo Real Maravilloso, Gallery Espace, New Delhi (2009). Maxine Henryson has been a member of A.I.R. Gallery, New York since 2012. Her photography is the subject of three monographs: Ujjayi’s Journey (Kehrer, 2012), Red Leaves and Golden Curtains (Kehrer, 2007), and Presence (Artist Publications, 2003).
Jane Swavely’s work is in public and private collections including Chase Manhattan Bank, and the Allentown Art Museum. Jane studied at Boston University and the School of Visual Arts in New York. She was the recipient of a Ford Foundation Fellowship. Previously represented by CDS Gallery, she is currently a member of A.I.R. Gallery where her most recent solo show, Jinx, took place in November 2018.
Jane Swavely has exhibited her work in solo exhibitions at A.I.R. Gallery, Brooklyn, NY, the New Arts Program, Kutztown, PA, Loyola College, Baltimore, MD, and at CDS Gallery, New York, NY. Additionally, her work has been featured in numerous group exhibitions in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, St Louis, San Francisco, Philadelphia, Nashville, and abroad. Swavely’s work has been featured in numerous contemporary art publications including a review of her latest solo exhibition by Sharon Butler in Two Coats of Paint, and feature interview by Anna Mikaela Ekstrand, Editor-in-Chief of Cultbytes.
She lives and works in New York City and serves as president of the Board of Directors at A.I.R., a historic non-profit artist-run exhibition space in New York City that supports the open exchange of ideas and risk-taking by self-identified women artists, founded in 1972.