NEW TALENt
yu cheng
Yu Cheng was born and raised in China, and received a B.S. in drawing from Harbin Normal University. Having worked as a graphic designer for several years, Cheng decided to devote herself full-time to painting and drawing and she earned her M.F.A. from the School of the Museum Fine Arts at Tufts University in the spring of 2024. Cheng is the recipient of an Elizabeth Greenshields Foundation Grant, among other awards and honors.
Artist Statement
My art is deeply influenced by my everyday experiences and the seemingly mundane moments that we all encounter in our lives. My artistic practice is centered around capturing these ordinary moments and presenting them in a way that highlights their beauty and significance. Through my art, I aim to create a visual representation of the subtle details that we often overlook in our daily lives.
I believe that an artist is someone who creates challenges and actively seeks solutions. This ongoing cycle of posing questions and seeking answers has become a fundamental part of my career aspirations.
The act of creation serves as a method of self-exploration, allowing me to gain a deeper understanding of who I am. As I embark on the process, I introduce images into my mind and progressively refine my comprehension of the challenges at hand, taking steps forward. The process of creating my art is my way of delving into self-discovery, and each work guides me toward the place it is meant to exist.
Through my art, I invite viewers to appreciate the beauty of simplicity and the ordinary aspects of life and to seek beauty that can be found in everyday moments, encouraging them to slow down and appreciate the world around them.
natalie conway
Natalie Conway received her MFA from Boston University in the spring of 2024. Prior to that she earned a BA from the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, where she also participated in a two-year Post-Baccalaureate program. Conway was an art teacher for several years before pursuing her MFA. She has received numerous grants and awards for her work, as well as for study, travel and curriculum design.
Artist Statement
I want to give shape to my inner thought world - the stuff I can’t capture in words. Using color and gesture intuitively, I create dense, layered paintings though a multitude of experimental processes. Bits of recognizable imagery and text point to my preoccupations with childhood, femininity, spirituality, science and education, while more abstract forms invite free association. Made on sturdy wooden supports, the surfaces and edges of these paintings reveal a history of deposition and erasure, rendering them objects as much as images.
My practice begins with remnants and fragments I collect with no end in mind: scraps of wood, dried-up chunks of gesso, trinkets and trash, along with doodles, word lists, and photos of the ground taken during walks. Scavenging and salvaging are vital to my lifestyle, and these activities provide the raw material for my creative practice. In the additive stage of putting paint to the surface, I see myself collaborating with chance and entropy, welcoming in whatever captures my attention.
Such openness entails overwhelming accumulation. I have to find ways to recover the most important forms that have been buried, which I do through physical excavation like scraping, sanding and polishing. All done by hand, this careful but extensive labor becomes another opportunity for discovery, yielding cross sections reminiscent of geological, biological and archaeological samples. Such specimens do serve as sources of inspiration, but also point to the ways in which my process affects my body: the compression and abrasion of materials wear on my skin, ligaments and bones.
Though the wounds and aches force me to attend to my age and present condition, my practice helps me rekindle a youthful sense of creativity. The accrual and removal of layers mirrors the nonlinear process of personal growth, in which unlearning is just as important as learning, and healing means bearing scars.
ellen weitkamp
Ellen Weitkamp received her BA from the Kansas City Art Institute and her MFA from Boston University. She has exhibited her work in various cities including Boston, Kansas City, Shanghai and Split, Croatia. Weitkamp has held residencies at the Frans Masereel Centrum in Kasterlee, Belgium and Hewnoaks in Lovell, Maine, among other awards and honors.
Artist Statement
My studio practice is a paced and daily conversation with place, reflecting on how I negotiate where the past, present and future sit. Pulling from images of my everyday life, whether it be an unmade bed, and empty driveway, or the interplay of light on a kitchen counter. My oil paintings and prints evolve as a process of rediscovering the environment I inhabit and discerning my place within it. What I depict transcends mere physical locations and metamorphoses into poignant symbols, acting as stand-ins that encapsulate the essence of people in my life, significant personal events, or serve as placeholders for emotions and moments suspended in time. In this way, my artwork reflects the consciousness that imbues every stroke, capturing not just objects but the rich experiences and emotions that define our lives.
My paintings emerge from a slow and meticulous process of collaging translucent and opaque layers, text and varying perspectives onto shaped and rectangular supports. This process reflects the expansiveness of time. Through my use of overlapping visual and written elements, spaces and meanings can be enveloped and revealed. For instance, in April-June, the text from a calendar floats over the exterior of a house, all of which is covered by marks and annotations.
The exchange between slow, meticulous painting and the rapidity of drawing allows my work to navigate the intricate dance between permanence and transience. With each composition, I infuse a heightened presence, a subtle nuance of the mundane, and a conscious effort to capture something unrepresentable: the ephemeral nature of time.