Janiva Ellis

Sites of cataclysm are strewn with the debris of worn cultural myths. Half-veiled effigies and jaded apparitions hover over havoc, populating these scenes with a pulp fueled levity. Angels, sexy and sorrowful, hint that violence cannot be disentangled from the glossy social sagas we fashion and rehash in order to conceal it.

Pillars of light pierce through gray plumes, signals fade in and out. A spectre of uncertainty hangs in the air, static like dust. In a constant stream of symbols, marks, and characters, recognition stalls. Areas of definition can easily veer into abstraction, so that when figures snap into focus the plotlines remain obscured. There’s an insistence that when things are viewed in fragments, or glimpsed through a dark glass, greater understanding can be gleaned than when they’re seen straight on.