Amy Reidel
Cling II: A Carescape
December 2, 2022 — February 2, 2023
Artist Talk January 21, 11am
High Low*
ARTIST STATEMENT
Through an interdisciplinary approach, I use abstract and figurative imagery to illuminate the bittersweet conditions of caregiving along with the duality of desperately loving another person during a time of global turmoil. The way in which caregiving and relationships are simultaneously regarded as both commonplace and clandestine fascinates me. They are concurrently elevated and degraded in mainstream society and frowned upon as subject matter in the art world. Still, the facial expressions, details and patterns in my work are inspired by the poignant emotions shared between family members, the often-disregarded health issues of women, and objects of lineage and domesticity. Grandma’s scarves and decorative rugs merge with darling baby and scared caregiver figures in an absurd representation of home and a rapidly declining climate-scape. Although the dazzling glitter, intense chroma and charming figures appear inviting, they also function as a protest or offering, attempting to save the world through a matriarchal revolution.
ARTIST BIO
Amy Reidel has exhibited work nationally since getting her BFA from the University of Missouri-St. Louis and her MFA at The University of Tennessee. She has been awarded residencies at ACRE (Artists’ Cooperative Residency and Exhibitions) based out of Chicago, the David and Julia White Artists’ colony in Cd. Colón, Costa Rica and at the Luminary Center for the Arts in St. Louis. Reidel’s artwork has been exhibited at the Contemporary Art Museum-St. Louis, The Sheldon Concert Hall and Art Galleries, Granite City Art and Design District (G-CADD), Lambert International Airport, Flood Plain Gallery, ACRE projects gallery in Chicago, Fluorescent Gallery in Knoxville, and the Amarillo Museum of Art among others. Her work has been showcased through media like Young Space, I Like Your Work podcast, Brenda Magazine (UK), St. Louis Public Radio, the PBS program Living St. Louis, the international publications Daily Serving and Strange Fire Collective and the Studio Break podcast. In 2015 Reidel co-founded the publication All the Art: The Visual Art Quarterly of St. Louis which seasonally printed and distributed 10,000 free copies across all zip codes of the St. Louis region for five years. Reidel lives and works in St. Louis with her family where she is also Assistant Professor of Art and Communication at STLCC-Meramec.
