Amanda Valdez makes colorful, multimedia works, populated by shapes that oscillate between representation and abstraction. The works have a very strong physicality, immediacy, and sense of embodiment. Various materials- embroidery, acrylic paint, fabric and canvas- are sewn together to become continuous, integral elements of the work. Sewn elements are not delicate. Fabric and stitches do not cede to painted elements, and the overall effect is one of materials acting out and asserting themselves. Yet the final work gives a sense of holistic embodiment, wrangled from the potential anxiety of fragmentation.
Amanda Valdez is a Brooklyn based artist, born in Seattle, Washington. She received her MFA from Hunter College in New York City and BFA from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Her work has been exhibited in El Regreso de los Dinosaurios at the Abrons Art Center in New York City, Same Same But Different at SOIL in Seattle, MsBehavior at the ArtBridge Drawing Room in New York City, The Return to Rattlesnake Mountain at the Wassaic Project in Wassaic, New York, Faraway Neighbor at Flux Factory in Queens, Don’t Fence Me In…Or Out at Lesley Heller Workspace in New York City. Valdez has been the recipient of a Yaddo Artist-in-Residency, MacDowell Colony Artist-in-Residency, the 2011 College Art Association MFA Professional-Development Fellowship, and is a contributing arts editor at Dossier Journal and Bomb Magazine.
Please join us to celebrate Amanda Valdez’s first solo gallery exhibition. RSVP on Facebook
