“Seductive Un/Realitites”

Curatorial Statement:

Pulled from the natural world, these two artists twist and contort our understanding of reality by skewing it into the realm of the unreal. In their works, they share an allusion to the known physical world that blurs the line between fact and fiction. Natural elements that seduce through lavish colors and textures that push beyond reality are paired with fabricated components conjured from the artists’ imagination. Both deal with mystical pictorial space that leads us into an unknown, yet familiar, world. While elements feel relatable, others transport into a psychedelically colorful, alternate reality.

Hayley Young’s vividly colorful paintings contain some known physicality in the form of floral elements and fragments of nature. Her works reference softened landscapes from her memories combined with unexpected curvilinear motifs. She utilizes an intuitive precision that reflects a universal desire to dream. The paintings reference surrealism and psychedelia while striving for introspection and reorientation.

Amelia Carley’s work imagines an otherworldly space rooted in personal mythologies, an obsession with the desert, and desolate spaces. These works explore a fictitious landscape as if surveying a new-found land. Based on miniature dioramas built using found glass detritus from a rehabilitated landfill, these painted renderings reference the mountainous structures of her upbringing in the American West. However, these images of fantastical spaces feel more akin to the depths of the ocean or a distant world.

Within the installation of these artists’ work in tandem, there are similar intuitive formations that paired together show their common language of naturalistically inspired forms. Their shared love of saturated hues lends itself to a transition of vibrant color which will be reflected within the installation experience through painted walls. As shown in the proposed exhibition layout, the room will be painted to reference the liminal space of dusk/dawn with a soft, horizontal fade. Works of the two artists will be intermingled, calling attention to similar curvilinear motions and color relationships. Moving through the space the viewer will not only discover new, unexpected worlds but feel the sensation of transitional light throughout the painted walls of the installation.  

From the intricate curved surfaces of orchids to the imagined meanderings through an invented land, these works feel like an uncanny remnant of a known earthly landscape. Both of these artists expand into a fictional interpretation of a reimagined world, hyper-focused on curiously colorful spaces that test one’s understanding of reality. These fictionalized environments rooted in lived experiences are a seductive fusion of the known and the unknown.