Jenna Girolamo
In Conversation with Jenna Girolamo: “Everything is always becoming and expanding.”
I am so happy that you were on board to exhibit here at Easthaus alongside Trevor Toney in our inaugural duo show, Seeing Through a Window. I also would like to thank you for sitting down (at your computer) for an online interview with Easthaus. Let's get started!
Easthaus:
Jenna Girolamo:
Thank you so much for having me. I’m extremely excited to be able to exhibit alongside Trevor for Easthaus’ opening!
EH:
And us here at Easthaus are extremely excited for you both. First, I think it would benefit us all for you to speak on your creative practice so we can get a sense of how your work comes to fruition. How would you describe your time in the studio? What is a successful day for you? How do you approach a new project or artwork? Where do you start? Where do you know when to end?
Great question. My studio practice is a tactile response process-based exploration. Mostly work on the floor with fabric dyes and house paint, working and moving around the canvas to fully address it. These past few months my tool of making has been my hands in a pair of dishwashing gloves, it allows for the ambiguity of the paint/dye on the surface. Studio time is “tinkering” time, I show up and putts around until something resolves itself. Most of the time I get jazzed up seeing raw canvas, this is where I like to start, with it on the floor, pre-soaked in water and bravery in my chest. Then, the dance begins. I know when to end when I start thinking too much.
JG:
EH:
I mentioned in the exhibition writing that one of your forebearers you turn to is Hilma af Klint, which seems so fitting for your work. Can you speak further on what draws you into her oeuvre? Who else is in your artistic family tree historically and who do you consider as your current contemporary colleagues? Who do you find yourself in dialogue with?
Oh Hilma.. For me, she kickstarted the notion that painting could be so otherworldly and guided. Discovering her work and how she worked enchanted me and the way I work. Her colors, the size she worked at, her passion. It’s inspiring to keep going, especially since during her days the recognition was minimal if not any. Helen Frankenthaler is definitely in my family tree, her mode of making and approach to slow color bleeds resonate with me. There is something about unapologetic women who have a creative process that commands their own that I find kinship with. Helen and Hilma were badasses, I doubt they took anyone's shenanigans. Right now my contemporary colleague is my cohort of the MFA program I’m in - we’re all bouncing ideas off one another and working through things together. It’s such a generative space to inhabit. I’m also looking at Sam Falls, Pipolotti Resit, Mary Watt, Heather Guertian, Vivian Suter, and Megan Brady.
JG:
EH:
There are some great names in your tree! I have talked to you and Trevor about the ways in which I feel that your work fits the conversation around this exhibition; which is speaking on uprooting expectations of perspective. How do you feel your work approaches the topic? What are some of the ways perspective has come up in your practice?
JG:
Perspective is the notion I’m trying to consider and address alternatively with my work. It’s taking something and addressing it in multiple different ways to fully comprehend it. Especially where I am right now in the program I am in, I’m trying to dissect what I’m doing. By doing this, It’s reconsidering my point of view on a lot of things. Uprooting expectations of perspective could be seen in my work through materially, assembly, and conceptually. I believe it’s a way of working and navigating through life.
EH:
As artists we all have different views about what it means to be an artist and to hold a creative practice. Would you mind telling us what your overall philosophy about art is? What keeps bringing you back to the studio? What do you feel is your role as an artist?
JG:
Oh goodness, the thing that keeps bringing me back to the studio is the need to get whatever is inside of my head out into the world to work with it physically. It’s a way that I can process life, and emotions and test out alternative hypotheses. It is also a sacred space for me to truly be. To tinker, to play. My role as an artist? I feel like it’s to share this perspective and to give a place to be able to reconsider how we navigate through our world. To bring awareness to our bodies and our relational connectivity to the world around us. Overall philosophy of art is a self-care act, to express oneself, however that manifests materially.
EH:
In thinking about connections I find it always interesting to see what artists have pinned up on their walls; deadlines, to-do lists, art inspiration/mood boards, ect. It says a lot about how the artist's mind works and how they connect the dots. Do you have any images from the studio you would like to share with us? What do you have up on your walls currently?
JG:
Yeah totally! I just finished up an 8-week summer intensive so the studio has been a mess after a mess but I’ll send over some photos to share. The walls have been covered with inspiration from aura photos, the sky, and more specifically the clouds that pass by over Portland. I’ve also been looking at German Romanticism and their depictions of the sky and how they grappled with the immensity of nature.
EH:
Jenna, thank you for your time interviewing for your duo exhibition, Seeing Through a Window, on view until September 30th here at Easthaus with Trevor Toney. For a closing dialogue we welcome you to plug any ongoing projects, events, upcoming thoughts, inspirational quotes; anything that you would like to share with the Easthaus and greater art community.
JG:
Thank you so much for having me! My MFA thesis show will be up in May of 2025, other than that - dream bigger than what you think! Everything is always becoming and expanding, including you.
