In the Beloved A new body of work by Alexis McGrigg

Ogden Museum presents, In the Beloved, a new body of work by Alexis McGrigg, that merges fluid abstraction, spiritual inquiry and an exploration of Blackness as both a physical and metaphysical space. Influenced by dance, film, literature and spiritual philosophy, including the writings of Octavia Butler, Malidoma Patrice Somé, Gary Zukav and Christina Lonsdale, this series investigates the origin and transcendence of the soul from a third space McGrigg calls The Beloved. This realm is in constant metamorphosis, allowing Black souls to exist in continual transition and transformation. Multidimensional in nature, The Beloved is a space where time can simultaneously collapse and expand, opening possibilities for alternate realities of the soul. Like the soul itself, esoteric and intangible, this body of work imagines a spiritual realm connected to ancestral lineage that transcends time and space, where the viewer is invited to venture beyond the physical plane.

Alexis McGrigg

In my personal ontology and narrative of Blackness, I have sought to understand the nature of our beginnings beyond that which we know through our physical being. For years, I considered how Blackness found its foundation in the body but at the same time was an all encompassing, intangible entity that surrounded us all. However, in my search to define and flesh out the alternating ways in which I presented the idea of this term in my work, it dawned on me that what I was calling Blackness was not simply an entity surrounding our existence; rather it referenced time just as much as space and the beings I believed to present in it. The broader term was and is multidimensional and points to different periods of existence and locations within a cyclical journey.

In my current body of work, I am using the picture plane as a window into this alternate space that the viewer can watch the cycles of being. We are able to see alternate worlds through space and time while also seeing our own interior world. It is a kind of deep knowing. The parallel realities within the picture plane are at once the same location, varied and yet the same. I see them as alternate timelines collapsing on each other and expanding over and over in cycles.

The formation of the figures are constantly fleeting in my paintings. I see them in a state of continual metamorphosis like a sticky web of tenuous vines. Some are shifting shape while others are actively in waiting for their moment of return. Each canvas is drenched in layered fabric dyes, permeating the surfaces and binding with the fibers. The water and saturation of colors is often unpredictable, and while I have some control over the outcome the water has the final say in its appearance. In the same way, the forms that take shape are uncertain. I follow the water and color until the forms reveal themselves to me, and the final image is a snapshot of a transient moment in time.