Through Edna’s relationship, we witness a woman exploring her own consciousness—or as we read, her “position in the universe.” This relationship has provided me with a framework for a meditation on my place as woman and an artist in Louisiana, which I honor and explore here with this new body of work. —Mallory Page
The nine works in A Ponderous Weight continue Page’s exploration of monochrome and how measured changes in hue can effect shifts in visual perception. The study of blue in this new series is inspired by the complex role of the sea in Kate Chopin’s turn-of-the-century and early feminist novel The Awakening. In the gallery’s first room, four blue works sized 83” x 95” are positioned atop small resin risers created by the artist. Unlike Page’s previous paintings, where brush and pouring motions are predominantly vertical, here Page has applied paint horizontally, with layers of paint choreographed on each canvas to recall the slow movement of water in the Gulf.
