Possibly Periwinkle

Curated by: Grace Hager

Zand Head and Friedman Galleries at MECA&D

Portland, Maine

Jun. 13 - Jul. 2, 2022

Colloquially called “The Periwinkle Project”, this show began from a call to collaborate from many of my peers within the MECA&D MFA community. As I began to think about a theme to pitch to the group, the new year had dawned and Pantone had just announced the 2022 ‘Color of the Year’: Very Peri, or periwinkle. While the exact shade selected by Pantone did not match my own thoughts of the perfect shade of periwinkle, this opened up one of the great possibilities that color grants us — that my conception or experience of a color could differ from the experience of another, even when exposed to the same color in reality. The periwinkle I see, nevermind that I like, could vary widely from the color another sees or prefers. This subjective breakdown and introduction of multitudes felt appropriate and generative for larger collaboration, and translation, through a community of connected artistic perspectives.

Periwinkle, as a particular color, lends itself to this expanded understanding. In mining my peers’ own associations with the color, it seemed to live in the in-between, the dual, and difficult to ascribe. Connoting the joyous and more ominous alike, it was described as always being a bringer of magic, an opposite of everyday, or a connector to other worlds or even to the past. In a continuing moment of uncertainty and unknowing, maybe a color that sometimes appears blue and sometimes appears purple is a perfect metaphor to collectively contemplate in our contemporary: to be curious, slow down, look again and closely, be open to changing what you once thought you knew, and dare to dream — that not knowing, or being hard to define, births weird and wonderful, unforseen possibility into this world.

Participating Artists:

Elana Adler

McKenna Bishop

Corinne Colpits

Grace Hager

Thao Kieu

Michelle Lassaline