Jennifer Graber

Untitled 1, 2009, pencil, watercolour, gouache and pastel on paper, 28×21 cm

Abstract painter Jennifer Graber works predominantly in watercolour, pastel and gouache on paper. The intimate size of her works contrasts with the large-scale of their composition. Her motifs at times appear to be generated from recollections of microscopic natural forms, while their grouping, abstracted on the painted page, create lacerated surfaces of fragile beauty. Haunting and ambiguous, these images ‘teeming with invisible life’ carry the viewer’s imagination into contradictory areas of perception. They have the capacity to simultaneously generate revulsion and joy, or comfort and fear. The provocation of such reactions reveal areas of our minds we may not yet have visited. Graber has commented of her work, that in worrying the paper ‘until rashes boil up’ she has sought to reveal: ‘…Things that are unseen and only imagined, the beauty in rot and decay, the ugliness in beauty…’

Untitled 2, 2009, pencil, watercolour, gouache and pastel on paper, 26.5×19 cm

Untitled 5, 2009, pencil, watercolour, gouache and pastel on paper, 26.5×19 cm

Untitled 11, 2009, pencil, watercolour, gouache and pastel on paper, 26.5×19 cm

Untitled 14, 2009, pencil, watercolour, gouache and pastel on paper, 26.5×19 cm

Untitled 16, 2009, pencil, watercolour, gouache and pastel on paper, 26.5×19 cm

Untitled 17, 2009, pencil, watercolour, gouache and pastel on paper, 26.5×19 cm

Untitled 3, 2009, pencil, watercolour, gouache and pastel on paper, 26.5×19 cm

Untitled 6, 2009, pencil, watercolour, gouache and pastel on paper, 26.5×19.5 cm

Untitled 7, 2009, pencil, watercolour, gouache and pastel on paper, 22.5×19.5 cm

Untitled 19, 2009, pencil, watercolour, gouache and pastel on paper, 26.5×19.5 cm

Untitled 18, 2009, pencil, watercolour, gouache and pastel on paper, 26.5×19 cm

Jennifer Graber studied at the Rhode Island School of Design. She lives and works in and outside Boston where she has exhibited on rare occasions. The works exhibited here are drawn from her recent production.