JACKLYNN KELSEY
March 30-31 // PILSON APARTMENT // CHICAGO, IL
Jacklynn Kelsey is a Chicago-based artist with a focus in soft sculpture and a background in painting and puppetry. Her work deals with ideas of comfort, home, and queer identity. Originally from Wyoming, she moved to Illinois in 2014 to earn her BFA at SAIC. Upon graduation, she worked as a seamstress for two years.
www.jacklynnkelsey.com
My first day of residency began sluggishly, with a cup of coffee and a look around my studio. Several weeks ago I began an appliqué painting that has since sat untouched in a corner, untouched. With 40 extra hours of free time on my hands, I’d spent the past week frantically filling my time with job applications and coronavirus-focused projects. I wanted to slow down and work on something that had already existed before the pandemic hit home.
I’d already cut several elements for this piece, unofficially nicknamed the Orange Window Piece: white vinyl hands, a vinyl wall outlet, and a sheer panel of four rectangles that would represent a window. Eventually, these pieces would be tacked down into a final collaged composition, but for now they were draped loose over the frame. I began with the slow and repetitive process of hand stitching along the perimeter of the rectangles. Despite the fact that I’d started this work prior, it struck me how relevant the image of a window is to our current moment. Unable to venture out frivolously, I spend my daylight hours sitting in the light of my apartment’s windows. I don’t know how many times I’ve accidentally made eye contact with my neighbors across the street who are doing the same. It’s actually the most sunlight I’ve had in months, since the warehouse I used to work in was a windowless concrete block.
Craving a faster and more direct method of working, I dove into the construction of some new bits and pieces to clutter the appliqué windowsill. I sketched the paraphernalia around me: teacups, spray bottles, glasses of water, and this face peering through a silver mirror. I cut templates from my sketches and stitched down the layers of fabric with my sewing machine. I couldn't go out and seek new materials, so I had reason to dig through old scraps and utilize colors and textures that I might not have given a chance otherwise.
My original intent was to complete the painting by the end of the two day period, but I began to reconsider the entire structure of the work. How could I best arrange the pieces to articulate a story? How should I position the hands? What if I need to pivot my prior conception of the work to match my new mental state? Rather than rushing forward, I decided to let these questions simmer while I shifted back into a prior artwork, the plague masks that I drafted during my first week of quarantine.
