Art Gallery

Magical Realism
Sarah Jacobs at the Majestic Gallery
August through October

I once considered my work to be Surreal but now I see it as more like my favorite literary genre, Magical Realism. Surrealists combine elements that are unrelated to shake the viewer out of what is expected. My paintings have fantastical elements that represent a surreality, but unlike true Surrealist paintings that combine unrelated elements to shock; I use related elements in unexpected ways to tell a story. Although the work appears other-worldly, it serves as metaphor for philosophies that can be applied to our daily lives.  – Sarah Jacobs

Sarah Jacobs is a Gettysburg-based multimedia painter represented in NYC by Fremin Gallery and in Pittsburgh by Zynka Gallery. Her artworks have been exhibited in the U.S. and in Europe and are in public and private collections in the U.S., U.K., and Hong Kong. She has had solo and two-person exhibitions in New York City, London, Wrocław, Poland and Bristol, U.K., among other cities.

Exhibition Statement:
In my life and art practice I consider the qualities of separation and oneness. Are we existentially isolated within our separate bodies, are we integral parts of a collective whole that we are only obliquely aware of, or are we simultaneously both? The deep-spaced paintings in the gallery were inspired by my belief that all beings are intrinsically important pieces of a larger whole, like how every jigsaw piece is necessary to create a full image. The deep skies, which represent the world beyond us, are paired with specific foreground imagery (birds, butterflies, etc.) which are depicted with more detail and specificity than their environments, suggesting that we relate to them as individuals. The deep and near are depicted together in overlapping layers that suggest that although we are individual actors playing out our lives, we are part of a larger system which we can only partially understand from our limited vantage points.

The look of the pieces in the gallery were inspired by reading about quantum theory. In this series multiple versions of the same sky or multiple different skies are depicted within one image, suggesting that multiple understandings of reality could be simultaneously valid.

SARAH JACOBS
sarahjacobsart.com
artist@sarahjacobsart.com