Essex Flowers is proud to present Jamie Chan and Sonya Derman in Indoor Interference, a two-artist exhibition curated by Sophia Ma. Play is at the center of their shared sensibilities for painting and image-making, with subjects like out-of-context baseball players, Renaissance figures, and visualized thoughts to explore the mind and externalize the internal. Using surprising colors, they destabilize the viewing experience, while inviting viewers to stay curious. They introduce components that challenge stylistic norms, such as cutting off legs at the ankles in Chan’s Cursorily Improvized Men (2023). Both paintmakers, Chan uses both earthen and synthetic paints, while Derman integrates homemade organic inks. Without the completed image in mind when they start, the artists observe what the drying process would yield and allow their work to evolve. In Derman’s Purple Birthday (2020), the testing page for her inks became a ground for noticing one’s own thoughts while working. By moving intuitively in their creative processes, the artists arrive at something expansive and open for what painting is to them.

https://essexflowers.us/JAMIE-CHAN-and-SONYA-DERMAN-INDOOR-INTERFERENCE