Pamela Michelle Johnson: Overindulgence
@ The Saw Room
1712 Sherman Ave, Evanston, IL 60201
Opening Saturday, January 6th, from 5PM - 8PM
On view through Saturday, February 17th
This time of year many of us are making resolutions to cut back and take better care of our bodies, but here at the Saw Room we are preparing to overindulge. Please join us Saturday, January 6th to view these tantalizing paintings by Pamela Michelle Johnson.
Join us for an Opening Reception Saturday, Jan. 6, 5-8pm and a second reception Saturday Feb. 3, 5-8pm. Exhibition runs January 6 – February 17.
Teetering towers of hamburgers, drippy stacks of syrupy waffles, sticky piles of sugary candy …Junk food. It’s the taste of America. It is what we eat. It is who we are. The insatiable American appetite is set on a path of consumption. Devouring to the point where we are left with nothing, nothing but the consequential garbage. Quintessentially American, junk food is not just part of our diet, it epitomizes our cultural ideals and social norms.
Through my work, I strive to invoke reflection on a culture focused on mass-consumption and mass-production, where the negative aspects of overindulgence are often forgotten or ignored. The work questions a culture that equates fulfillment, pleasure and happiness with what we consume.
Whether it is gluttonous quantities of larger than life junk food or the solitary empty wrapper, abandoned soon after devouring was complete, the images are charged with social relevance. The work flaunts our culture back at us. It questions embracing a culture of complete and instant gratification while ignoring the consequences of our indulgences. The work questions many of our cultural ideals and social norms. These are the pictures of our insatiable appetites; they are the pictures of the consequences.
The heightened realism of these paintings serves to remind viewers that this is a mirror to our culture. Overbearing scale and gluttonous quantities, juxtaposed against foods that are both tempting and comforting, examine the conflict between enjoying the highly processed, artificially flavored bounty of American life and the progression to overindulgence and gluttonous excess. The work is both gross and enticing. Empty wrappers forgotten and abandoned in a world of nothingness, question the sustainability of our excesses. The use of intense lighting and deep shadows coupled with exaggerated scale and unique compositions updates the classical notion of still life painting and gives it a contemporary twist.
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Tags: Evanston, Illinois, Overindulgence, Pamela Michelle Johnson, The Alley Gallery, The Saw Room
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