ARTICLES / PUBLICATIONS

Pen + Brush is excited to present "THE NOW: Fever Dreams", a group exhibition opening May 16 featuring vignettes of work by artists: Antonia Bara, Heather Brammeier, Martha Bone, Sandra Cavanagh, Angela Fraleigh, Crystal Marshall, Tara Sabharwal, Heather Marie Scholl, and Jia Sung. This is P+B's fourth iteration of Now exhibitions, an ongoing series that brings focus to artists who are the undiscovered “ones to watch” and are creating works that capture the pulse of today. "THE NOW: Fever Dreams" builds on this evolving nature of "the now" as it pertains to contemporary art and temporality by bringing together works by eight artists that share more than just a dream-like quality—they share in their intensity and feverish depictions of liminal space and time. Works on view merge visions of unsustainable pleasure, anxieties, and the mythological feminine. Hallucinatory scenes lacking reason are met with skillful compositions that refute traditional hierarchies of order and, like a fever dream, react to an untenable environment. In some cases, like that of Crystal Marshall, divine visions are shown. These visions criticize society while depicting transcendental beings who are freed from chaos in their post-human existence. Larger works, like those by Sandra Cavanagh, Angela Fraleigh, and Tara Sabharwal, merge social, political, moral, literary, or historical components with a dream-like rejection of order. These works, together with Heather Brammeier’s installation (premiering June 6th), and smaller-scale works by Antonia Bara, Crystal Marshall, Heather Marie Scholl, and Jia Sung, come together to point out hidden meanings that, at times, disrupt coercive power structures and continue a dialogue on the relevance of contemporary art. "The Now: Fever Dreams" tests limits of definitions surrounding “established” contemporary art while bringing together current socially relevant themes of feminism, crisis, globalism, and indeed, psychoanalysis to inform its aesthetic.

Crystal Marshall is an Afro-Caribbean visual artist currently residing in Atlanta, Georgia. The artist makes heartfelt work, often imbued with an intense dark blue palette. Marshall generates an ethnic fusion of surrealism, offering a deep inquiry and examination of the patriarchal system. Born in Long Island, New York, but raised in Kingston, Jamaica until the age of 20, she attended the Edna Manley School of the Visual and Performing Arts in Jamaica. After which she migrated back to the US to attend Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore, Maryland and received her B.F.A. Her migrations between geographical locations are expressed and further deepened within the expanse of her otherworldly paintings. Her personal experiences inform and inspire her narrative and figurative paintings. She combines seemingly opposing principles like spirituality and science to create captivating fantasy realms. Marshall's culture shock in the U.S. led her to focus on identity, societal ills, and technological advancement, all of which has helped to shape her work.

2024

NEW AMERICAN PAINTINGS

ISSUE # 166

2023

AESTHETICA MAGAZINE

2023

SUPERSONIC CONTEMPORARY ART FEBRUARY 2023

NEW AMERICAN PAINTINGS 2022, SOUTH ISSUE #160

CICA ART NOW 2022

CICA MUSEUM

Chapman Cultural Center

Spartanburg Art Museum plans exhibition programming years in advance. Black Anatomy was an idea that unfolded while the curatorial staff was reviewing submissions back in 2020, and they saw many conceptual commonalities between four participating artists; Frederick Hayes, Donte Hayes, Crystal Marshall, and Carla Jay Harris. We chose the title, Black Anatomy because these artists refer to the experiences of body as a subject in some way or another. The word anatomy means the study of the structure of the internal workings of something. It lends itself to the process of looking deeper at the internal workings of the Black experience, historically and in contemporary culture.