Rachael Zur

Region: MFA Annual


Traces of us linger in the physical world, even in our absence. There is an evocative nature to domestic objects and spaces; items within homes hold the residual energy of lives lived long after people are gone. My work depicts ordinary objects from living rooms that hold a remaining radiance and tenderness of the departed. I work with materials that have weight to them to ground ephemeral concepts into an artwork that is physically solid and fixed. The artwork holds the ideas and feelings, which are light and almost impossible to contain—similar to how homes can hold the lingering domestic presence of those who are gone. Contour lines move across the surface of my paintings like phantoms; or, at other times, one defines the edge of a work, articulating a wing or hand as a fully present body.