Mary Jane PArker:

narratives

March 5-28, 2024*

FIRST WEDNESDAY OPENING: Mar 6, FROM 6 - 9PM

ARTICULATE ARTIST TALK: SUNDAY, Mar 10, AT 4PM.

NORMAL GALLERY HOURS: TUE - SUN, 12PM - 6PM

FOLLOW US AT BRGALLERY FOR UPDATES AND IMAGES!

*Note: BRG will be closed on Saturday, March 16 for the “Wearin’ of the Green” parade.

A mixed media artist based in New Orleans, LA, Mary Jane Parker’s recent work is concerned with the ways that our bodies - from marks acquired at birth to scrapes and cuts that define our life’s story -serve as historical records. She has also explored studies of hysteria and outward displays of inward emotional turmoil.

“My work has often included objects that hold memory—a piece of lace, a pressed plant or a perfume bottle—and are often paired with a female figure. In this current body of work, with the help of my backyard garden, I have brought these elements together into work that hints at a narrative, one that invites viewers to unravel layers of meaning woven into the elements.

In the drawings, I have reduced the media to simple materials––paper, gouache and graphite. The negative space is filled with intricate patterns while the positive space is left empty, save for some descriptive contour lines. The choice of using translucent paper is deliberate as its surface is delicate and “skin-like.” My process is slow and meditative allowing me to guide the work as it develops.” - Parker

Parker’s work has been shown nationally and internationally and is included in the permanent collection of the New Orleans Museum of Art, the LSU Museum of Art, and the Center for Book Arts in New York, as well as in numerous private collections. She was awarded a Pollock-Krasner Foundation Fellowship in 2007; a Louisiana Division of the Arts Fellowship in 1990 and 2001, a National Endowment for the Arts/Southern Arts Federation Award for Excellence, and an NEA Independent Study Fellowship. She currently serves as the chair of the Visual Arts Department at the New Orleans Center for Creative where she is also on the faculty.

This exhibition is presented alongside the latest works from Libby Johnson, Leslie Koptcho, and Brandon Surtain. All works from these artists are on view, free of charge, during regular gallery hours (12 - 6 p.m., Tue - Sun) from March 5 - 28, 2024.