Artist Statement

 “When we fall in love with the living world, we cannot be bystanders to its destruction.” - Robin Wall Kimmerrer

My work explores kinship, mystery, and reverence for the more-than-human world.  Paintings and etchings emerge from intimate encounters with elements of nature that I inhabit and that inhabit me.  I spend a lot of time in the swamps in and around the Atchafalaya Basin in South Louisiana, so the flora, fauna, light, and water I encounter there is especially present in my work. My presence in the landscape and practice in my studio strengthen my relationship with the land in its beauty and fragility, as well as my sense of responsibility for an environment that is on the front lines of a rapidly changing climate.

My subjects include both the visible and invisible aspects of these intimate encounters, in waking life and in dreams, translated from direct observation and through the language of symbols. I collect water everywhere I go, leaving something when I take something, and mix that water with paint to imbue my objects with the essence of time and place and the memory that the water carries. I paint the spirit of the land to reflect our interdependence and kinship.

Here in Bulbancha (colonially known as New Orleans), which translates to “the land where many languages are spoken,” my practice is to continue to deepen my receptivity to more-than-human languages and ways of being.  I consider each painting a record of all that we stand to lose as the planet warms and the land vanishes. Rather than striving towards naturalistic representation, I aim to render the mystery I find in these hypnotic encounters. I hope to invite viewers into an awareness of a kinship with the land that may become an antidote to estrangement, from the earth and each other and ourselves. 

Bio

Madeleine Kelly is an artist and educator currently living in New Orleans. She received her MFA from the University of New Orleans in May 2024.  A long time arts educator, she currently teaches drawing and painting courses at UNO. She is the recipient of the 2024 Homer L. Hitt Society Art Award, and is the 2024 King Range National Conservation Area Artist-in-Residence. She has shown work locally at the Good Children Gallery, the Bywater Art Lofts Gallery, and the Fletcher Hall Gallery at the University of Lafayette. Her work has been featured in the New Orleans Arts Rag and Antenna Signals Magazine.

Her solo exhibition, Wayfinders, will open at the Berry Biodiversity Conservation Center at the University of Wyoming on July 13th.