Jasmine Justice
Curated by David Reed
April 26 – June 2, 2007
Opening Reception: Thursday, April 26, 6-8pm

Jasmine Justice was born in 1972 in West Virginia. As a child she moved to Wyoming, Idaho, and Washington State and has also lived in Helsinki and Istanbul. At age 13 she became involved with the thriving punk scene of Spokane, WA and its visual arts subculture. She then moved to Seattle, WA where she received a BFA in printmaking, from the University of Washington in 1997. Two years later she moved to New York and worked as a printmaker before attending Rutgers University, NJ where she received an MFA in 2003. She now lives and works in Brooklyn, NY. She participated in residencies at Painting's Edge, Idyllwild, CA (2003 and 2006) and at the Atlantic Center for the Arts (ACA), in New Smyrna Beach, FL (2006), and has recently been included in group exhibitions at HIGH ENERGY CONSTRUCTS in Los Angeles, CA; Domo Gallery in Summit, NJ; The Riverside Art Museum in Riverside, CA, and ZieherSmith Inc. in New York, NY. Her 2007 show at CUE Foundation marks her first solo exhibition.

David Reed is a painter. Born in California, he moved to Lower Manhattan in 1971, where he continues to live and work. Since 1976, he has been represented in New York by Max Protetch Gallery. His first show in Europe was with Galerie Ricke in Cologne in 1989, and he has also been showing in Europe with Galerie Xippas in Paris; Galerie Bob van Orsouw in Zürich; and Galerie Schmidt Maczollek in Cologne. In 1998, David Reed Paintings: Motion Pictures, a traveling exhibition and publication was organized by the Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego, CA. Leave Yourself Behind: Paintings and Special Projects 1967-2005, another traveling exhibition and publication was organized by the Ulrich Museum of Art, Wichita, KS in 2005.

ARTIST'S STATEMENT

I don't ever want to know what a piece will look like until it's finished. I make art to develop new mental avenues and experience them in the physical realm, exploring and meditating upon unknowns, thinking and making as simultaneously as possible.

I'll get a strong feeling about a very particular shade of green and a compulsion to put it into play. As the piece progresses I hold loosely to green's role, its dominance fluctuating. If it escapes I might not notice immediately. It might lead to recognizable imagery, or not. Incidents are allowed to remain at the brink of clarity or finish. The early stages of mental emergence are worth appreciating. I have a fondness for these blunt yet malleable syntactical units, which conversely arouse my appetite for lavish, painterly activity.

CURATOR'S STATEMENT

by David Reed

Diamonds are…

(Big Rock Candy)

I first saw Jasmine Justice's work when I was a visiting artist at Rutgers (Fancy). I liked the rough physicality and materiality of her paintings (Plus or Minus). I especially remember seeing a green painting that had been worked over many times (Chloro-fill) and a sheet of glass leaning against the wall with clotted, dripping yellow paint (Grape Crush)-a piece that was hard to call a painting (Grit). We spoke during that first meeting about '70s experimental abstraction (Seventies Secretion).

I like the way the physicality of her paintings can turn into an image (Urban Orbs), a doubling that never seems possible, even as one sees it (Hovercrop). Looking at the paintings for this show, this doubling reminds me of Gilles Deleuze's description of crystal-form as a kind of form in which the actual and virtual images are so united one can no longer distinguish which is which (Recycled (Kiss)). In Jasmine's paintings this crystal-form is complicated again by being both figurative and abstract (Calamity Jane).

Her paintings are very theatrical (Skirt). As proof, she is very good with titles (Busypark). I wish that I could think of such excellent titles for my paintings (Headlights).

Her paintings seem to have a story behind them (Savior (Isis Painting)). What stories do they make with their doublings and combinations (Blushing Bride)? Why do we want to follow these stories (Painter's Tears)?

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YOUNG ART CRITICS: Jenni Wu on Jasmine Justice