Jessica Dickinson Sold at Auction Prices

b. 1975 -

Jessica Dickinson - b. 1975, Saint Paul, Minnesota

Born in Saint Paul, Minnesota, in 1975, Jessica Dickinson received a BFA from the Maryland Institute College of Art, Baltimore (1997), and an MFA from Cranbrook Academy of Art, Bloomfield Hills, Michigan (1999), both in painting. Her practice, which is primarily situated in abstract painting, also encompasses works on paper and graphite rubbings. She often finds inspiration in the visual effects of light or pattern, translating and obscuring these luminous occurrences into spatial abstractions through repeatedly marking, altering, and reworking of the surface of her works.

Shifts in time are at the center of Dickinson’s practice. Typically, she begins her paintings with a wood panel and applies multiple coats of limestone polymer to create a sculptural surface before adding oil paint (sometimes mixed with wax), while simultaneously distressing and chipping away at the coated layers. Her paintings mimic a process of decay by exposing the impact of time on the medium. Dickinson’s approach to reworking the material surface led to a group of works she calls the remainders, which began in 2010. These graphite rubbings of each significant change to a painting together form an index of gestures over time. Transcriptions of a surface that once was, they archive accumulation, accident, intention, and chance through previously applied pigment. Dickinson is drawn to abstraction as it allows for multiple interpretations and a variety of references, and her works lend themselves to a more considered way of viewing not just the final painting, but also the labor and process behind their construction.

Dickinson’s work was featured in a solo presentation at the 2014 Armory Show in New York. She has had numerous solo exhibitions at James Fuentes Gallery, New York, and has participated in group shows at RISD Museum, Providence (2011); Ethan Cohen Kube, Beacon, New York (2013); and the Warehouse, Dallas (2014). She is the recipient of numerous awards and grants from such organizations as the Marie Walsh Sharpe Art Foundation Space Program (2001–02); Change, Inc. (2003); Farpath Residency, Dijon, France (2008); and Belle Foundation for Cultural Development (2013). Dickinson lives and works in Brooklyn.