DECEMBER 16th 2024
Copyright Pe Ferreira
Today felt surreal. Walking into the gallery at Mendes Wood DM, seeing the culmination of months of work displayed as Jewel, my latest exhibition, I felt a strange mix of pride, vulnerability, and exhilaration. The space radiates an energy that feels both intimate and monumental—it’s humbling to witness how the works have taken on a life of their own here.
The new paintings hang with quiet confidence, their textured layers inviting the eye to travel through their intricate worlds. Across the room, the stamp artworks—imprints of carved foam cushions—balance this energy with their tactile immediacy, each mark infused with the rhythm of repetition. These pieces feel almost like artifacts, holding something raw, like imprints of memory. I spent so many hours carving those cushions, testing their designs, and layering the stamps to create something that feels spontaneous, but precise. Seeing them on the walls, breathing in their autonomy, is still sinking in.
I’ve been rereading parts of the press release, drawn to how it articulates what I struggled to put into words throughout the process. One line stayed with me all day:
“In Jewel, the artist carves into the intimate softness of domestic materials, reshaping them into tools for dialogue. The foam stamps, with their playful geometry and their echoes of imperfection, perform a delicate act of translation—transforming the personal into something legible yet ambiguous, familiar yet otherworldly.”
This idea of “reshaping” really resonates. When I started carving those foam cushions, I didn’t know exactly where I was going, but I trusted the process to reveal its own logic. That line about “echoes of imperfection” feels especially important. The paintings and stamp works aren’t perfect—they’re deliberately layered with traces of mistakes and reworkings, moments where I let the material push back.
Another excerpt touches on something I hadn’t fully realized until I saw the show installed:
“The exhibition unfolds like a fragmented narrative, where each work serves as a jewel—separate, yet connected to a larger constellation. Together, the paintings and stamp pieces suggest a language that resists resolution, inviting viewers to dwell in the gaps between form and meaning.”
I love that image: a constellation of jewels, each one glinting with its own story. The gaps between meaning feel so essential to my practice, to letting the work stay alive and open-ended.
The gallery has done such a beautiful job curating the space. The light catches the textures of the foam-stamp patterns and the layered brushwork in the paintings, bringing out details I wasn’t even fully aware of while making them. It’s a reminder of how collaboration—between artist, gallery, audience—shapes the life of an artwork.
It’s hard to believe there are only two weeks left for the show. I’m so grateful for how this exhibition has come together, for how Jewel is resonating with others. Tonight, I’m holding on to that constellation of moments, imperfect and shimmering.
If you stop by before the end of December, let me know what you think. I’d love to hear how Jewel speaks to you.
(Exhibition: November 20 - December 21st, 2024, Mendes Wood DM, New York)