Artist reception Thursday of next week at Middlesex Community College

Middlesex Community College Pegasus Gallery
100 Training Hill Road, Chapman Hall, Middletown, 1-800-818-5501
Jennifer Wheeler: Recent Works in the Pegasus Gallery
Through Oct. 31, 2011.
Artist reception: Thurs., Oct. 13, 11:30 a.m.—1 p.m. in Pegasus Gallery.

Press release

Jennifer Wheeler employs bright, saturated colors and dislocating compositions of both formal and narrative themes. Paintings in Wheeler’s Wonderland series are hallucinogenic riffs on the horror vacui ("fear of empty space") traditions of Celtic and Islamic art in as much as the abstract space of a kaleidoscope. Here however, fragmented imagery of the “Alice in Wonderland” narrative collide within a world of both implied violence and imaginary play. Whirling and tumbling Alice figures, menacing cats, rabbits and mushroom forms are engaged by Godzilla, baby dolls and Barbie. Upturned dresses and suggestive paper cutout imagery are threatened by long dramatic shadows. In this series Alice's adventure is a loss of innocence and references more expansive issues of childhood trauma

Wheeler holds a BFA from the Lyme Academy College of Art where she currently teaches. She earned an MFA from Western Connecticut State University and also teaches at the University of Connecticut and Three Rivers Community College.