"Pairings" celebrates the welding of both likely and unlikely candidates. This body of work continues to explore the merging of unconventional materials and goes beyond so by also exploring other marriages in art. Opportunities for pleasant pairings can emerge within subject matter, materials, concepts, and by pairing the paintings themselves. The exhibition explores partners compositionally and beyond. Some of the work is intentionally paired, presented side by side, in such a way that could potentially be interchanged. Two 60 x 60” paintings hang side by side as a diptych, but are individual compositions that each also work alone, or paired with another 60 x 60” piece from the opposite diptych.

Driven to bring new life to objects that might otherwise be lost or deteriorated in time, Kelsey Irvin collects traces of lives lived, memories misplaced in need of recognition, and uses them in her work collaboratively with the paint itself. Most often she works with a wide range of vintage ephemera, found object, oil, acrylic, fabric, leather, and graphite. Irvin’s work reaches for a balance between the past and the present, while acknowledging what might trigger sentimentality in the future. The vintage ephemera is meant to ignite a treasure hunt of sorts. She aims to acknowledge and pay reverence to the history of those materials. Each object used tells a story, and each piece itself holds a deeper meaning as the sum of its parts.

Following the opening reception, the exhibit will be on view through March 30.