How best to cultivate truth and magic? Some say it is done so through a release, by emptying pockets and maintaining neutral calm. Jenna Hoffart proposes a more cumulative and theatrical approach. Through painting and installation, Un-fashioned and Half Made-Up stages a production that guides the creation of authenticity through adornment, multiplicities, and exaggeration.
Truth and reality are always richer within our interior worlds, senses, and imaginations. They can be difficult to articulate, as bringing them to the outside requires flattening them for another’s consumption. Hoffart resists this diminishment through theatricality. The actors in these realities are shaped by starched collars, suits and ties, lavish accessories in abundance. Gloves and bared hands make up a captivated audience, simultaneously witnessing and creating the spectacle before them. Careful stagecraft of lighting, smoke, and mirrors illuminate the magic held there. The original texture of Hoffart’s truth remains untouchable but the drama allows us toglean its richness.
Like a trapdoor, there is always more to something than what is immediately seen. To fully express authenticity, there must also be a willingness to reach inside hidden depths and embrace multiplicities. When people are at their best, they are round and layered – every aspect of the self, good and otherwise, acknowledged and expressed. Hoffart explores this visually through moral apparitions and dual souls occupying the same suit, while identifying additional kinetic energies – comets and magic – as tools for further expansion. It is through accumulation of experience, and a knowing of both the self and the world around us, that we begin to see the truth of ourselves, fashioned and clear.
Un-fashioned and Half Made-Up calls out for the capture of authenticity in unabashed theatrics, grand reveals of interior worlds, and thoughtful adornment of the suits shaped in their likeness. It asks for looking, listening, and a capacity for something more. When you peek behind the curtain, what peeks back?
Esplanade Project Space is located along the exterior façade of the Esplanade Arts & Heritage Center, along 2nd Street and 4th Avenue, and is comprised of four vitrines. This unique and accessible exhibition space is dedicated to presenting work by individuals and groups based-in or with strong ties to Medicine Hat. The exhibitions reflect the diversity and richness of our city’s arts and heritage and aim to cultivate vibrancy within the downtown core.
