Redbud Arts Center is excited to announce our upcoming exhibition, “Ancestral Reverie,” featuring the works of artist Amanda Barry Jones. The exhibition will open Saturday, August 3, showcasing a captivating collection that explores themes of heritage, memory, and identity.
Amanda Barry Jones, known for her emotionally resonant pieces, delves into the depths of ancestral connections and the reverberations of the past in contemporary life. “Ancestral Reverie” invites viewers on a journey through time, weaving together personal and collective histories through intricately created ceramic sculptures.
Artist Statement
My quasi-narrative artworks, inspired by nature, mythology, and human ancestry, draw on the cultural reverence and iconography of flora, fauna, and traditions. Using ceramics, a material rooted in geological time, I preserve culture, convey messages, and shape identity. Expansive landscapes and recurring sculptural forms, like empty shells, invite contemplation about humanity’s place and impact in the universe, emphasizing the ephemeral nature of life and the passage of time.
This series, Ancestral Reverie, utilizes the unique effects of illustrating with glaze on ceramic wall forms to create abstract landscapes, imbued with an eerie and haunting allure. Many draw inspiration from my childhood near the swamps of the Big Thicket, echoing memories of the land that built me. Ethereal shapes emerge within these landscapes, serving as a bridge to our ancestral past and the indigenous inhabitants who once traversed these lands. This tribute to those who preceded us features the sun or moon presiding over the horizon, becoming an enduring connection to history and a visual thread weaving through our collective landscapes.
Please join us for the opening reception on Saturday, August 3, 6pm-9pm.
Free and open to the public.