Elizabeth Leach Gallery is pleased to present Michelle Ross, I Am Your Signal, an exhibition of new boldly-colored abstract paintings. Ross’s paintings satisfyingly challenge the static experience of viewing through her enlivened, lush palette and dynamic formal considerations.
In Ross’s words, her studio practice seeks to “activate curiosity and tolerance through materiality, form, color and sign” and these new works are inspired by academic research and art historical writings on abstract painting. The works highlight the artist’s interest in spatial tension and disruptions of linear perspective through layered surfaces that hold the rigorous building, dismantling and reconstruction of diagonal lines and geometric shapes.
Deeply saturated blues, ranging from indigo to ultramarine to cobalt, complement icy whites, warm yellows and brilliant pinks. Ross’s addition of reflective silver leaf accents glimmer, disappear or darken through the viewer’s movement. Edges and outlines of painted shapes evoke origami-like paper creases, further emphasizing spatial considerations that allow the artwork to unfold before the viewer’s eyes.
Michelle Ross examines the boundaries between painting, photography, and popular media, creating new relationships, both conceptual and aesthetic, that mirror the shifting realities of our time. Her formal and abstract painting, as well as digital collages, have been exhibited in solo and group exhibitions both nationally and internationally, including the Institute of Contemporary Art Boston (Boston, Massachusetts), The Art Gym at Marylhurst University (Marylhurst, OR), Portland Art Museum (Portland, OR) and Rome International University (Rome, Italy). Her work resides in several collections, including the Portland Art Museum (Portland, OR), Rhode Island School of Design Special Collections (Providence, RI) and the Four Seasons Hotel (Abu Dhabi, UAE), among others. In 2012, Ross was named as a Hallie Ford Fellow in the Visual Arts. Her recent commission, four massive site-specific paintings measuring 16 feet tall by 7 feet wide at The Standard Insurance Company in 2020 marks her largest-scale project to date.