Chamisa Ghosts and Nightworks
Jane Shoenfeld
August 20 - September 6, 2024
Reception: August 23, 5-7pm
Strata Gallery presents Chamisa Ghosts and Nightworks, an exhibition of pastel and mixed media paintings by Jane Shoenfeld. The exhibition will open on August 20 and run through September 6, with a reception on Friday, August 23 from 5-7 pm, including an artist's talk at 6 pm.
In this new series of pastel paintings, Shoenfeld grounds herself in the visual complexity of northern New Mexico’s indigenous shrub, chamisa. The magical and structural combine as Shoenfeld, nearing 80, explores her own impermanence within an intimate relationship to nature. In these works, after a phase of largely abstract painting, Shoenfeld has returned to careful observation of the visual world at the same time as she contemplates ghosts and the unknowns of time. Shoenfeld is a master of the pastel medium. Color’s emotional impact is central as representations of chamisa coalesce with images of her face and silvery hair becomes chamisa streaming in the wind. Surprises are welcomed into Shoenfeld’s art as landscape merges with self portrait. Alongside Jane’s pastel paintings, half a dozen photographs of chamisa will be displayed.
This exhibit also includes a series of small mixed media paintings called “Nightworks” that were created during sleepless nights. Jane layers pastel and water based ink pencils on top of watercolor washes. These pieces are a conversation between the eye, hand, insomnia and the unconscious.
In 2024, Shoenfeld’s exhibitions included curated selections into Drawings From Perception, Invention, and Memory at the Robert & Elaine Stein Galleries at Wright University in Dayton, Ohio and a suite of five pastels curated into The Big Small Show, The Drawing Rooms, Newark, NJ. Shoenfeld was also honored with a two person exhibit based on chamisa with Katherine Meyer at HERE Gallery, Santa Fe. Three of Shoenfeld’s pastels were recently curated into a permanent exhibit at the University of NM Hospital Tower.
Shoenfeld taught for 15 years at the former College of Santa Fe. Although no longer part of academia, she continues to teach plein air pastel classes in the spring and fall in Santa Fe and at Ghost Ranch. She is also a published poet and has received honors for her ekphrastic (poems about painting) poetry.
Strata Gallery is open from 11 am to 5 pm Tuesday – Saturday. For more information about Strata Gallery, the current exhibit, and the future schedule of events, please visit the Strata Gallery website and Instagram.
Jane Shoenfeld, In Her Own World, Pastel on Tinted, Sanded Paper, 19” x 18”
Jane Shoenfeld, High Desert Homage,
Pastel and Acrylic on Sanded Paper, 24” x 39.5”
Jane Shoenfeld, Eye on Chamisa, Diptych, Pastel and Acrylic on Sanded Paper, 25.25” x 9.25”
(12” x 8.75” individual panel size)