Install image of Revori, at SALON, a Public Works Gallery.
Exhibition : REVORI
Location: SALON, a Public Works Gallery
Dates: June 1 - June 26
Artist Talk & Film Screening: June 22 | 6pm
In Revori, you are walking into the beginning of an involuntary day dream; a download. Somewhere between the present reality and the dream world where Critty Smitty is able to visit ancestors and their higher self, a place where animal guides, religious iconography and abundant verdant gardens offer an intuitive vernacular of clues to navigate difficult emotion.
The title of the show is a play on the French word for daydreaming (reverie) and the Yoruba word referring to one’s intuition or destiny (ori) - an apt epithet for a body of work illuminating the artists process of cultivating a deeper relationship with self - confronting aspects of experiences that are difficult to view. Heavy blues contain liquid depths of emotion while deep blacks hint at the shadow work carried out in mystic realms of the sleeping psyche.
The central piece, Seeing, is a masculine self portrait in the blackest black - a nod to Kerry James Marshall's black bodies of beauty and historical reclamation. In Isis and Nepthis in the Astral Garden, nude self portraits depict a vision of the artist as both Isis & Nepthisis, who were seen as individuals and as one entity - offering insight into the experience of holding a multifaceted self in an age of individualism and personal brands. The lush array of botanicals laced throughout the work are abundant symbols of the artist's ability to harness dream re-entry as means to intuitive plant medicine. The reliance on lucid states to receive otherworldly messaging is reminiscent of the radical art of Hilma Af Klint, an artist who sparked a deep reaction for Critty Smitty.
Critty Smitty (b. 1989, Ypsilanti, MI) utilizes dream re-entry, intuitive plant medicine and color as a medium to cultivate a deeper relationship with difficult aspects of self, revealing prolific mythologies in spiritual realms. Paintings, papercut work, risographs,and animations offer a peek behind the curtain at the etheric process to discover self and ancestors; utilizing non-colonial ways of knowledge. Community access and participation is an important component of Critty Smitty’s art practice. They have exhibited in group shows including Local Content at E14 Gallery (Oakland), Friends of Irrelevant Press at Aggregate Gallery (Oakland), Queer Expo at Clay Clubhouse (Oakland). Her art books and zines are represented by Irrelevant Press (CA & NY). She has participated in a panel discussion on the arts at Shack 15 in partnership with Oakland Art Murmur. Critty Smitty’s murals are on view throughout the Bay Area, including murals for 826 Valencia, Tenderloin Community Benefit District (TLBD), the Ferry Building, Shack15, SBVRSL, Oakland Unified School District and Touchstone. She holds a Bachelor of Fine Art from University of Michigan and is currently running a shop and creative space in downtown Oakland, CA.
