JO NANAJIAN She/Her
Jo Nanajian was born in Beirut, Lebanon in 1996 and immigrated to Boston, MA in 2008. She received a BFA in General Fine Arts and a concentration in Book Arts from the Maryland Institute College of Art in 2018. Focusing on charcoal as a medium, Nanajian is driven by her intuition and gesture to create large scale abstracted pieces. The goal is to capture her emotions from an unprocessed memory that ultimately resulted in a feeling of loss of control. She explores these emotions by distorting figures using a repeated draw-and-erase technique until it is unrecognizable, a response to the death of her “American Dream”.
Website: Jonanajian.com
Work Samples
This image list contains the artists whom are already considered for the future exhibit, more will be added but these are examples of what will be presented.Project Description:
The preliminary concept for the grant is to occupy a space for local BIPOC artists to showcase their work in an exhibit. Specifically through an already established gallery, the reason for this is due to the networking connections that are associated through these commercial spaces. Displaying work is important but can be further beneficial for artists to be in a space where the audience may be more willing to purchase work for the price that it's truly valued at, or even gain connections that may help them further along their career.Eyevan, a local artist who grew up in Jamaica Plain, and myself will be collaborating on curating the show together. We will be applying/reaching out to “calls for exhibition proposals” within the city. There will be about 10 selected artists for this exhibition, all local and all who should be showcased more than what they were given. The funding will go to proper shipment and handling of the pieces to insure ample safety and respect to the work. It will also go to artist talks by the participating and visiting artists.
It is important to change the dynamic of how we see these spaces and who gets to occupy them as the audience and as the artists. Typically gallery spaces give off an exclusive lifestyle that are traditionally occupied by an older white crowd. My goal with this exhibition is to create a show curated by BIPOC artists, displaying BIPOC artists and inviting their community thus changing the company of these events while still benefiting off the networking connections that are associated with these spaces. The more you see yourself in these experiences the more you are inclined to apply for them. There will be roughly 10 artists, ranging in age, gender, and artform. Exhibitions can be limited to what is displayed and I plan on having a variety of work from photography, paintings, installation etc.