The SLO Museum of Art is pleased to present the first museum retrospective by contemporary artist Alyssa Monks. The exhibition will bring together paintings that span the arc of Monks’ career, from the early 2000’s to works created during the pandemic. Through paintings that are expressive, lush, and often intimate, Monks conveys the very essence of being human through works that meditate on love, loss, and the perennial search for self.

The paintings included in this exhibition feature large-scale portraits of Monks and those closest to her, portrayed in vulnerable or intimate contexts. Often capturing fragmented elements of a scene, or layering together various spaces and moments, Monks’ works disorient the viewer and invite reflection on one’s own vulnerability. Through the use of thickly applied brushstrokes, and her tendency to flip the background and foreground in her work using semi-transparent filters of glass, vinyl, steam, water and or foliage over shallow spaces, Monks creates surface tension in her work that eschews easy interpretation of her subject matter.

This exhibit is showing from August 27th – November 13th at the SLO Museum of Art. See SLOMA website for more details.