Amanda Valdez at Denny Dimin

AMANDA VALDEZ: First Might at DENNY DIMIN is on view from September 7 to October 14, 2018.

Amanda Valdez (MFA Hunter, 2011) is a research-based artist who is best known for her mixed-media paintings, which incorporate sewing, embroidery, fabric, oil stick and other paint media. Her works, which begin with the act of drawing, reference landscape, physical experiences, and art, archaeological objects, and architecture that she encounters in her research and travel. Valdez’s works reflect the histories that the body holds in its physical makeup: scars, sags, symmetries and asymmetries, wrinkles, and marks. Valdez draws from this vast matrix of experiences, both personal and historical, to create her evocative shapes.

Valdez’s research has recently led her to discover the hidden lives and art practices of women from ancient times through the Renaissance. A central figure in her recent work is Tanit, an ancient Phoenician goddess, and the shape of her upraised arms. These forms have inspired and generated new paintings for Valdez for the past few years, culminating in a large-scale weaving composed of several varying weaving techniques and materials, called full Tanit. Valdez researched and produced this tour de force at the New Roots Foundation in Guatemala. In addition to this work, the show will include new paintings, which showcase Valdez’s research of various quilting techniques and her push beyond the seductiveness of the embroidery to thick, expressive oil stick on paper.

Amanda Valdez received her MFA from Hunter College in New York City and BFA from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Her most recent solo exhibitions include Ladies’ Night at the Mead Art Museum at Amherst College, Hot Bed at Dot Fiftyone Gallery in Miami, and The Mysteries at Koki Arts in Tokyo. She has also recently exhibited at NADA New York (with Denny Gallery) and at The Landing in Los Angeles. Valdez has received prestigious artist residencies at the New Roots Foundation, the Joan Mitchell Foundation, Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts, Byrdcliffe, MacDowell Colony, and Yaddo. She has received grants from the Joan Mitchell Foundation, New York Foundation for the Arts, Hunter College, the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and the 2011 College Art Association MFA Professional-Development Fellowship. Her work is in the collections of the Davis Museum at Wellesley College and the Mead Art Museum at Amherst College, as well as numerous significant private art collections.