Feature Exhibition, Trove Gallery, Park City, UT

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New contemporary work available! 

Dimensional. Sculptural. Kinetic. Living Art.

It would be a great honor if you could join me in the celebration opening night
Friday February, 23 from 6-9PM.

Make a night of it in the fresh mountain air!
Book your dinner reservations today. 

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ARTIST STATEMENT

My paintings are an investigation of the intersection of traditional landscape imagery and modern ideas about painting and color. In my practice, I attempt to reconcile my personal history as an art-maker, as well as the tradition of landscape painting, with a contemporary art practice that borrows more specifically from a language of Modernism—specifically in regards to mid-century conversations about painting.  Incidentally, both genres at work in my practice (abstraction and landscape) have a tradition of exploring ideas about the Sublime—Romantic and Modern—respectively. 

While my subject matter draws heavily from landscape, my process and true exploration is about painting in a Modern sense. My brush strokes become objects that hold their own presence. The colors and layering I use both create the illusion of space and undermine it in the proverbial push-pull of abstract painting.  The interplay between light and shadows cast upon the many layers ads to the sculptural interpretation while also creating ‘living’ paintings that appear kinetic, interacting with the natural environment. The purpose of the layering of a transparent painting surface is to raise the stakes; the points of depth are deeper and the points of flatness are flatter. The increased depth and complication of flipping the surface back and forth and layering it multiple times is a demonstration of the mastery of the material as well as a device to push the boundaries of the flatness/depth dichotomy in every painting. My paintings are at once paintings and sculptures and they are at once landscapes and quite the opposite of that—something acrylic and manufactured that is more reflective of contemporary culture.  

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Current Exhibitions

Desire Lines, Utah Museum of Contemporary Art
Salt Lake City - Until May, 26
   

"The Line Up", 27" x 33" Acrylic on Multi-Layered Acrylic Glass

       
                                                       
Square One: Helper Artists of Utah, Finch Lane Gallery
Salt Lake City, UT - Until February 23.
   

"Me and My Friends, 40" x 40" Acrylic on Multi-Layered Acrylic Glass

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Upcoming Exhibition

Woodbury Art Museum, UVU, Art of Our Century: Janell James, Spotlight Artist
May 10 - July 14, Orem, UT

SLUG Mag Feature Article and the UMOCA Desire Lines Exhibition

Check out the feature article in SLUG Magazine and see a few pics during opening night at the Utah Museum of Contemporary Art.

The Utah Museum of Contemporary Art’s (UMOCA) Main Gallery exhibition, Desire Lines, went up on Jan. 26. The show explores representations of the erosion that living beings exact onto the landscape via creating pathways. Of 15 total, Desire Lines features three local artists, Jane Christensen, Janell James and Kelly Larsen, who discuss their participation in the show.

"The Line Up", 27" x 33" Acrylic on Multi-Layered Acrylic is on exhibition at UMOCA until May 26

SLUG: Please tell us some background about you as an artist and your present artistic practice.
Janell James: I was classically trained at the Bay Area Artists Atelier in San Francisco and then studied in Paris. This way of learning is very tight and technical, and helped me to understand draftsmanship, line, form and light. I knew early on that my personality wouldn’t last long in the classical realism style and what I really wanted was to loosen up my artistic approach. This is when I found the Helper School in Utah, taught by professors from the University of Utah, Paul Davis and David Dornan. Davis and Dornan were great masters at teaching me how to loosen up through various mark-making and random techniques that really helped me evolve as an artist. Twelve years of dedicated study to my craft and continual willingness to learn and try new things is what has helped my work evolve into something with a very unique and original voice.

SLUG: How does your work in the show represent the landscape?
James: Traditionally, landscape art has wanted to connect us back to nature, and I try to do this in a way that combines multiple styles, including traditional, modernism and contemporary art, so that there is a little bit of something for everyone. I mainly paint trees with a composition that allows them to move beyond their borders into the room … My work on acrylic will at first appear to the viewer as a 2-D painting. People are always surprised when they walk up on the work and see the added depth and dimension that was not initially obvious …We relate to nature in the same way. When we are physically in nature, we begin to notice the subtleties and deeper beauty.

SLUG: Specifically regarding the definition of desire lines being paths created by human- or animal-footfall traffic, how does your work respond to that idea?
James: My goal has always been to bridge the gap between traditional and contemporary art through my work. This is my path if you will … through the past and its wealth of tradition into the present, where I can explore those ideas through a contemporary vernacular, eventually having found my own line.

Janell James. Photo courtesy of the Artist.

SLUG: What mediums do you employ for your pieces? Why did you choose them?
James: Acrylic plexiglass and acrylic paint. I chose them because they are, in many ways, the polar opposite of traditional mediums—a way to take very complex, age-old master’s techniques like reverse painting and the glazing and layering of oil paints, exploding them onto modern mediums that speak more to current times.

SLUG: What challenges did you face in creating your work for this show, and how did you respond to them?
James: When I was first approached to be a part of Desire Lines, I was thrilled and honored. Realizing I currently have six exhibitions on the books between now and May, you might say I created another puzzle to solve. They say we aren’t given more than we can handle in life, and so far, I’m digging my heals in and enjoying every minute of it, along with some occasional scream therapy and a little dry white wine.

SLUG: Given the politicized state of the Utah landscape in light of Bears Ears National Monument and the conversations happening around the landscape, how might your work comment on or participate in that dialogue?
James: I’m not a political artist, but with the politicized state of the landscape in Utah, it’s been weighing on my mind and is finding it’s way into my work in small ways. One of my latest paintings is titled “Sacred,” and it is of a Southern Utah Juniper tree … The age alone of some of those trees amazes me. Another recent painting is titled “We Stand Together.” Both of these works were finished during the week of the Bears Ears protest at the State Capitol, which I attended. My heart was in my throat while I was there standing with people who shared the same passion, hopes and ideas. The making and titles of those works are ways of marking significant moments for me, and hopefully, they will spark a bigger dialogue about what inspired them.

SLUG: Besides Desire Lines, how may people see/find your work, whether online, in person or otherwise?
James: I’m represented by four galleries nationally with Trove Gallery in Park City, Utah; Rare Gallery in Jackson Hole, Wyoming; Terakedis Fine Art in Billings, Montana; and Zarks Gallery in Eureka Springs, Arkansas. I have recently been contacted by galleries interested in my work in San Francisco and Washington, D.C., with a growing national presence. I have a strong online presence as well on Facebook, Janell James Artist; on Instagram and Twitter as @janelljamesartist. Including three museum shows, a feature gallery opening, a group exhibition I co-curated/facilitated with Donna Poulton about Helper Artists and one art fair between now and May, I continue to have a strong regional, exhibition, gallery and museum presence. Upcoming exhibitions: Finch Lane Gallery is currently exhibiting Square One: Helper Artists of Utah, Jan. 12–Feb. 23. Trove Gallery in Park City is curating a feature exhibition of my work Feb. 23–March 9 with an opening reception Feb. 23. At UMOCA, Desire Lines, runs  through May 26, having opened Jan. 26. C.M. Russell Exhibition and Auction, Great Falls, Montana, Feb. 15–March 15. UVU, Woodbury Art Museum, Spotlight Artist Janell James, May 10–July 14, Orem, Utah, opening May 15.

Desire Lines is at UMOCA (20 S. West Temple) through May 26. For more information, go to utahmoca.org.



      

Current and Upcoming Exhibitions:

"The Letter", 20" x 16" Acrylic on Multi-Layered Acrylic, Trove Gallery, Park City, UT
Opening Feature Exhibition and Reception February 23, 6-9PM - Exhibited through March 9

"Me and My Friends", 40" x 40" Acrylic on Multi-Layered Acrylic
Showing at Finch Lane until February 23
 

See my painting at the Desire Lines Exhibition, Opening January 26 at the Utah Museum of Contemporary Art! →

I am excited to announce my participation in Desire Lines, Opening Today...
Utah Museum of Contemporary Art!

RSVP with me personally to attend the VIP/Member Reception from 5-7PM

"The Line Up", 27" x 33" Acrylic on Multi-Layered Acrylic 

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DESIRE LINES

MAIN GALLERY: JAN 26 – MAY 26 | 2018
OPENING RECEPTION: JAN 26 | 7 – 9 PM

“Desire Line – a path created as a consequence of erosion caused by human or animal foot-fall or traffic. The path usually represents the shortest or most easily navigated route between an origin and destination. Desire lines emerge as shortcuts where constructed ways take a circuitous route, have gaps or are non-existent.” (Wikipedia)

The landscape as a genre has held captive the imagination of the American public for the better part of the last two centuries. With unbound adoration, we have embraced the landscape, from the grandeur of the paintings of the Hudson School to the manifest destiny myth of a rugged and unspoiled west. Americans have been drawn to artists’ interpretation of place, real and fictional.  Despite the popularity of the landscape, too often the public conceptualizes these works in a very traditional way, whether that is plein air oil, watercolor painting or photographs that are devoid of any hint of human disturbance.

Desire Lines highlights the various paths, ranging from archiving to reproduction to collaborations with nature to works that critique the history of landscape focused art, taken by the artists included in the exhibition to explore our complicated relationship to the landscape that shapes and supports us and our repeated desire to represent it. 

LIST OF FEATURED ARTISTS: 

Ameila Carley
Barry Stone
Brian Patterson
Carly Glovinski
Ian Fisher
Jane Christensen
Janell James

Kelly Larsen
Kirsten Kay Thoen
Maddison Colvin
Michael Handley
Molly Kaderka
Penelope Umbrico
Sara Frantz and Trevor Amery

Visit the Utah Museum of Contemporary Art for more information and directions. 

All images and text © 2018 Janell James Studios and Janell James Artist.

Square One: Helper Artists of Utah - January 12 - February 23, 2018

Please Join Us January 19 during SLC Gallery Stroll
Panel Discussion 5PM - 6PM. Artist Opening Reception 6PM - 9PM

Below is your invitation and a Curatorial Essay by Donna Poulton, Ph.D.

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The Finch Lane Art Gallery is pleased to announce the exhibition:

SQUARE ONE: HELPER ARTISTS OF UTAH

Once an abandoned mining town, Helper, Utah is now a thriving art community.

The success of Helper was an unintended consequence of the desire of a number of

educators, led by art professors David Dornan and Paul Davis, who found that the

lonely town offered not only the solitude they needed for creativity in their own work,

but aordable space to teach serious art students the fundamentals of drawing and

painting contemporary realism. Armed with the mantra, “learn your craft,” the Helper

school opened in the spring of 1995. The school’s teachers didn’t just tell students how

to paint, they showed them how to paint. Dornan noted “…if a student wants to paint

a better apple, show them how to paint a better apple, don’t start talking about the

relevance of an apple.” For Paul Davis, the school oered space for clarity, “after a while

it got so that you could see what a student was thinking while looking at their drawing

or painting, then you could help them to understand that the problem had nothing to

do with mere talent, but that the issue was more about the way in which they focused

their minds.”
 

The lesson they hoped to teach students is that draftsmanship along with extended

periods of immersion in one’s craft are among the fundamental building blocks for

creativity. This exhibition examines the work of a number of extraordinary artists who

studied at the Helper school and who attribute their level of artistry and success to the

generosity and talent of its teachers. These distinguished artists sell work throughout

the country, some directly from their studios in Helper. While they share the lineage of

their craft, with slight and subtle veins of thematic and stylistic similarities, each has a

distinct style.
 

Donna L. Poulton, Ph.D., Exhibition Curator
 

All images and text © 2018 Janell James Studios and Janell James Artist.

                

Happy New Year!!! May 2018 be a year filled with art that makes you smile!

Nationally emerging artist Janell James is reinventing the landscape with unique dimensional paintings on multiple panes of acrylic glass. These paintings are singular in approach, sculptural and kinetic becoming 'living' paintings as light shifts and plays between the layers, casting shadows and illuminating her subjects.

"Janell's work is mesmerizing, vibrant and sophisticated, bridging the gap between traditional and contemporary art."
~ Rick Armstrong, Rare Gallery Fine Art, Jackson Hole, WY


It is an honor to be a part of the following 2018 Exhibitions.
Please join me if you can!

Finch Lane Gallery, Square One: Artists of Helper, January 12 - February 23, SLC, UT.
Artist Opening Reception with Panel Discussion, January 19, 5PM - 9PM.

Utah Museum of Contemporary Art, Desire Lines, January 26 - May 26, SLC, UT. Opening Reception, January 26.


Trove Gallery, Featured Artist Exhibition, February 23 - March 9, Park City, UT.
Artist Opening Reception February 23, 6PM - 9PM.

C.M. Russell Museum Exhibition, February 15 - March 15, Great Falls, MT.
C. M. Russell Auction, Mansfield Convention Center, March, 16.

Out West Art Show and Sale, March 14 - 17, Great Falls, MT.
Best Western Heritage Inn, Room #262.

Woodbury Art Museum, UVU, Art Of Our Century: Spotlight Artist Janell James, May 10 - July 14, Orem, UT.
Artist Opening Reception May 15, 6PM - 8PM.


I'm looking forward to 2018, creating art, and celebrating successes with you!
Wishing you and yours all the best in 2018!

Sincerely,
Janell
 

"Me and My Friends", 40" x 40" acrylic on multi-layered acrylic glass. Finch Lane Gallery Opening, January 19, SLC, UT.