MARTHA JACKSON JARVIS

Martha Jackson Jarvis bears witness to her great-great-great-great grandfather's experience as an enlisted free Black militia man during the American Revolutionary War in What The Trees Have Seen II. In May of 1781, Luke Valentine and his cohort, led by Captain Adam Clements, engaged in battle at points from Bedford County, Virginia to the shores of South Carolina. This was a treacherous and unpredictable passage across uncharted territories, particularly for a Black man in the American South.

In November of 1832, Valentine made a declaration in order to receive his pension for his services in the Revolution, the documentation of which led to Jarvis' discovery of him and his story, more than 150 years later.

Inspired by this newfound family history, Jarvis speculatively retraces his steps, resulting in her signature, large-scale abstract paintings in which she tracks his physical and emotional journey through various landscapes, both wild and domestic, embedding the work with constructed memories of a bygone time and place.

Jarvis’ practice spans decades and media, from large-scale sculpture and public art installations to works on paper. Among her signature materials is a black walnut ink foraged and produced by Jarvis herself, imbuing the work with a raw materiality that is both singular and historically relevant. The works are cumulative, and Jarvis introduces new shapes, textures, and tones as abruptly as a journey introduces hurdles and passage.

Monumental scale is nothing new for Jarvis, with many of her sculptures and public works projects existing unabashedly in the third-dimension. Whether she is incorporating the remnants of domestic objects previously owned by those she loves, or using natural materials taken from the world around her, Jarvis asserts the existence of a spiritual network that tethers us to our environments and each other. The sheer size of the paintings seem to pull from these worldly inclinations, large enough to fill a viewer's field of vision and produce an all-encompassing effect that roots one in place.

Cycles of generational exchange and storytelling are felt in Jarvis’ use of mandalas as motifs, the symbol holding space in the compositions as a regenerative emblem. The radial pattern, evocative of the sun, ovum, or other life-giving, natural forms along with the colorfully abstract painted forms, is occasionally juxtaposed with black and white stripes. These represent moments of clarity and familiar paths of travel, a reminder that he can always find his way back, regardless of nature's unpredictable disruptions.

The symbolism of the mandala points to many of the themes Jarvis navigates within her work: wholeness, harmony, the journey of the spirit, and acknowledgement of one's interconnectedness with a greater design.

MARTHA JACKSON JARVIS (b. 1952) explores form, structure, and scale through a multi-media practice. Growing up in Lynchburg, Virginia, and Philadelphia, now living and working in Washington, D.C., Jarvis’ multifarious practice challenges the viewer to find the extraordinary in our cultural and physical environments. Her works conjure themes of ritual and repetitive action and are made in reverence to the cycles of renewal, degradation, and transformation. The artist’s work functions as an abstracted, emotional response to research concerning her lineage and familial history. Receiving a BFA from Temple University, and an MFA from Antioch University, Jarvis’ work has been exhibited in solo and group exhibitions in galleries and museums throughout the United States and abroad, including a recent solo show at the Baltimore Museum of Art, and prior exhibitions at the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C.; the Studio Museum of Harlem; Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, Philadelphia; Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art, Winston-Salem, N.C.; Anacostia Museum in Washington, D.C. and the Tretyakov Gallery Moscow, U.S.S.R.

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MARTHA JACKSON JARVIS: What The Trees Have Seen II

What The Trees Have Seen II

Susan Inglett Gallery

THE ART SHOW: BOOTH B7

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