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JESSICA BAKER
Woodstock NY UNITED STATES
My work engages with the ephemeral through a mixed-media visual practice. It has been the subject of an interview with National Public Radio and presented in exhibitions across the United States and internationally. My artworks are held in both private and institutional collections and have been critically recognized, including coverage by The New York Times. I am a recent recipient of the New Visions Award from the Woodstock Artists Association and Museum, with prior honors including a printmaking fellowship and three artist residencies.
I stopped making art when I became my mom’s primary caregiver during her final two years suffering from Parkinson’s. The last time she was well enough to visit my home she brought one of her garden perennials in a mess of dirt and insisted on helping plant it in my yard. From this mess grew a white Astilbe, a flowering bush I admire through the French doors of my studio. I wish I appreciated her more in those moments – her presence and quiet influence.
After she passed, I brought the things she treasured into my studio: seashells, embroidery patterns and thread, decks of playing cards. Holding the things that she lovingly touched countless times helped me connect to her again, but in a new way.
Like the mess of dirt that was transformed into something beautiful outside my studio. 'Posthumous Collections I' was created by repairing decks of my mom’s playing cards using her embroidery thread to sew them together. Some of the cards were lost or irreparable, thus the holes in the finished tapestry.
ARTWORKS
EXHIBITIONS
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