Relevance, 35th Anniversary Exhibition II
Amy Pleasant’s work includes painting, drawing, and ceramic sculpture, all exploring the body and language through repetition. Pleasant explores the fragmented figure as sign or symbol. With a limited palette and an economy of line, she draws images like writing a letter, documenting essential, universal motions and human behaviors. This repetitive and calligraphic drawing process creates a visual language over time, like an alphabet. In her clay work, she uses a similar process, cutting figurative forms out of hand rolled slabs, maintaining a sense of directness and intuitiveness that is similar to her drawing and painting practice.
Amy Pleasant received a BFA from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago (1994) and an MFA from the Tyler School of Art (1999).
She has held solo exhibitions at Geary Contemporary (NYC/Millerton), Laney Contemporary (Savannah, GA), Institute 193 (Lexington, KY); Jeff Bailey Gallery (NYC/Hudson); whitespace gallery (Atlanta, GA); Indianapolis Museum of Contemporary Art (IN); Birmingham Museum of Art (AL); Atlanta Contemporary, (GA), among others.
Ink and gouache on paper
34 x 26 in.
Her work has been included in numerous group exhibitions at venues such as Hesse Flatow (NYC); SEPTEMBER (Hudson, NY); Mindy Solomon Gallery (Miami, FL); Tif Sigfrids (Athens, GA); Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts (AL); Adams and Ollman (Portland, OR); Cuevas Tilleard Projects (NYC); Knoxville Museum of Art (TN); Zuckerman Museum of Art, Kennesaw (GA); Lamar Dodd School of Art (Athens, GA); Hunter Museum of American Art (Chattanooga, TN).
Pleasant is a John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellow (2018) and received the South Arts Prize for the State of Alabama (2018). Other awards include a Joan Mitchell Foundation Painters and Sculptors Award (2015), and Individual Artist Fellowships from the Cultural Alliance of Birmingham (2008) and the Alabama State Council on the Arts (2019/2003).
Amy Pleasant’s first monograph, The Messenger’s Mouth Was Heavy, was recently released including essays by Daniel Fuller and Katie Geha, and was copublished by Institute 193 and Frank.
Her work has been reviewed in many publications including Art in America, Art Papers, Artforum, The Brooklyn Rail and Sculpture.
Space One Eleven Involvement: Exhibiting Artist: Bama 2004