All of the artworks that are included in this exhibition embody the exploration of the natural world. Each artwork demonstrates how the landscape around them exists in the artist's mind. Each artist in the exhibition has a different psychological interpretation of the real or imagined landscape, but they are all able to utilize this personally significant landscape as an emotional vessel to transcribe their memories and emotions into a visual reality that the viewers can understand.



Blue Shell Decorative Frame with SeaScape

This piece by Anna Valdez depicts a ceramic frame with a painted ocean landscape in the center. We as the viewers are unsure if this landscape is real or imagined, but either way is of important significance to the artist. The beautiful colors and decorative shell frame give the viewers a way to see into the artist’s reality. Anna Valdez’s work often focuses on her own life and her human impact on places and things, and this idea can be seen in this work. The very stylistic representation of this ocean landscape is representative of her human impact on nature and landscapes within her own life, whether that impact is a physical or emotional one. The bold brushstrokes of the landscape and the very organic nature of the painted shell frame complement each other and seem to give a hint of peaceful coexistence between the artist and the landscape. The landscape depicted within the ceramic frame is an interpretation of the artist's emotions and what is important to her and is represented in a visual way that the audience can understand.
 

Windswept

The abstract landscapes that Madeline Peckenpaugh creates, such as this work Windswept, are inspired by her memories and everyday experiences. This piece engages the viewers by getting them to understand the impact that humans and nature have on each other. You can see in Windswept that there are no human depictions, but you can tell from the presence of these manipulated, fabricated forms amongst the surrounding abstract, natural landscape, that there has been some human interaction. It is unclear whether this space is imagined or real, but the manipulation of the landscape allows the viewer to understand the way in which the artist’s own perspective and thoughts have been translated into this natural form.  



All Encores

Ross Taylor’s exploration of the natural form as an emotional vessel plays with color and perspective. It is up to the viewer to decipher the artist’s personal narrative through this work, but the use of bold colors and fragmented perspectives can help the viewer to understand how the artist’s memories and emotions are translated into a visual representation of a landscape. It is the unique use of perspective in this piece that helps the audience see this landscape as a means of expression and can be used to help the viewer understand how a landscape can bring about these emotions and memories



Emma

This piece by Joan Bankemper takes the colors and forms from the natural landscape and combines them into a complex ceramic piece. Inspired by her love of nature, Bankemper uses her work to address the relationship of people to nature, and as seasons change and landscapes transform, people do as well. There are many different representations of this change throughout her piece. Butterflies are often used to represent change, and birds are vessels themselves that help to pollinate plants and aid in the changing seasons. This piece also includes human figures, which is something that no other piece does, this could be to represent a different kind of change since it is no secret that humans are the cause of many different changes throughout the world, good and bad, just as they change and grow themselves. Bankemper uses her work as an emotional vessel in a very unique way. By utilizing specific elements from the natural landscape as well as human figures, she is able to express how people change just as nature and landscapes do.



Bibliography

“Home.” Anna Valdez's Portfolio, https://www.annavaldez.com/.

“Joan Bankemper: Emma (2020): Available for Sale.” Artsy,

https://www.artsy.net/artwork/joan-bankemper-emma. 

“Madeline Peckenpaugh: Artist at Alexander Berggruen.” Alexander Berggruen, 1 Nov. 2022, 

https://alexanderberggruen.com/artists/madeline-peckenpaugh/.

“Ross Taylor.” Sophie Gannon Gallery, 

https://sophiegannongallery.com.au/artist/ross-taylor/#:~:text=Ross%20Taylor%20is%20

based%20in,Newcastle%20Upon%20Tyne%20(UK).

“The Natural World: Part II (March 9-April 13, 2022).” Alexander Berggruen, 28 June 

2022, https://alexanderberggruen.com/exhibitions/the-natural-world-part-ii/.