Sarah’s thesis show [not images, just an ad] is up! The reception was on Friday night. She was one of 7 MFA Fine Arts students in the show, along with two photographers, a metal-worker, ceramacist, sculptor.
I think her paintings are fantastic — beautiful, strange, complex — and the show seems to be a big hit; she’s been receiving accolades from all sides, and she even sold the most expensive painting on Friday night — “Umwelt,” a.k.a. the bat painting, probably my favorite if I had to choose, so I feel a bit melancholy about its leaving our life so soon — to a complete stranger. The MFA has been long & hard in some respects but it’s now possible to look back and see all the stress, self-doubt, and very hard work as leading to this point and to painting that is (I think) richer and most original than the work she’d been doing previously. So I guess it was worth it.
I’m also proud of her for doing the work she wanted to do, when at times it must have been tempting to change her approach to something closer to the norm within her program (which tends to focus on representational, figure-based painting).
She’s going to put all the images up somewhere, but for now, here are two of the paintings, “Swamp,” one of several more representational paintings of plants and cacti, and “Full Moon Sushi Night,” which is one of a group of three somewhat wilder, more abstract paintings that grapple with the representation of nonhuman experience of time and space.
Here is her artist’s statement:
“How do you paint a living thing – for example, a bat? The lesser long-nosed bat migrates across the Sonoran Desert every year from Mexico to North America. It follows a specific nectar corridor across the burning desert. Columnar cacti like the Saguaro bloom at night, exuding a melon-like scent. Without the sustenance of the nectar from blooming columnar cacti, the bats wouldn’t survive the long trip, and the bat guano fertilizes the cactus. The two creatures are locked into a fragile interdependence resting on delicate timing. The bats use echolocation, not perceptible to human ears. The bat, or any living creature, embodies more times and spaces than my human eyes can perceive.
How do you paint a smell? How do you paint echolocation? – a bat’s, a whale’s? How do you tell the story of any living thing?”
Sarah can be emailed at: sarahp812 AT gmail.com, and the images can be seen at:
http://sarahpearce.blogspot.com/
Ivan Kreilkamp 
Wow!
The paintings were fantastic and I would love to see the longer version of her blurb. I’ve long been fascinated with the representation of other senses in varied media; in fact, I dream of a symphony of smells.
PS BTW, Ivan, in case you’re wondering, less than 5 minutes (but I knew it was there!)
Joanna sent me the link. Please tell Sarah these are really amazing! And congratulations on finishing her MFA. I hope you have a nice bottle of wine on hand to celebrate.
Congratulations Sarah! We still need to buy one of your paintings for our house – Steve and I were just talking about it. Your new stuff looks so awesome!
It is great to hear that all is well with you! We’re waiting for the birth of number 2 any day now – will keep you posted.
Love,
Melissa and Steve
Sarah: These paintings are really incredible. I LOVE them!! Congrats on finishing the MFA, but even more congrats on being able to paint so damn well! I hope you start bringing home some serious bacon with these babies and allow Ivan to retire to work on his blog full time. Oh wait, he’s doing that already isn’t he? Really really amazing stuff. Congrats again!!
XOXOXOX
jeremy