Hanna Brody: Bodily Color – Jackson’s Artwork Weblog

Hanna Brody gained a Visitor Decide’s Alternative Award chosen by Eleanor Johnson in Jackson’s Artwork Prize this yr together with her work I Woke Up Embarrassed With A Ache In My Head. On this interview, she discusses how she creates her claustrophobic compositions, using acidic inexperienced in her award-winning portray, and the affect of Renaissance and Baroque work on her work.

Above picture: Hanna Brody in her studio in Albuquerque, New Mexico

Josephine: May you share the story of the way you turned an artist and inform us extra about your creative background?

Hanna: There’s a picture of me round age six with work hung in all places behind me which might be masking the partitions of my dad and mom’ home with an indication I wrote that claims “Hanna’s Gallery Present”. I started to take portray extra critically in highschool when a public artwork faculty opened in New Mexico, the place I grew up, and I transferred there. At this faculty, artwork making was prioritised, and I discovered that it was simply as essential as different educational topics. I attempted later to pursue different profession paths which may have offered me with extra monetary safety over time, however I at all times felt resentment once I was unable to color. After spending my 20’s working in numerous areas of the artwork world in New York, and portray through the moments that I might handle, I made a decision to maneuver again to New Mexico for Graduate Faculty. I used to be wanting to have the time and house (each bodily and mentally) to dedicate to my follow.

Josephine: What does a typical working day within the studio appear like for you? Do you could have any essential routines or rituals?

Hanna: Whereas within the studio, I sometimes alternate between drawing and portray or portray giant and small. Whereas one work dries, I deal with one other. I shouldn’t have a particular routine whereas within the studio, however I choose to work with espresso or weight loss plan coke close by, and a TV present taking part in that may be largely ignored – actuality exhibits or one thing I’ve watched many occasions. I prioritise breaks once I bear in mind to; stepping exterior to breathe air with out fumes, or stepping throughout the room to view my work from afar.

Josephine: Which supplies or instruments might you not stay with out?

Hanna: Oil paint and charcoal. My sketches are accomplished in charcoal, and not too long ago I’ve been incorporating moments of this materials into my work, although oil paint is my major and most popular medium. Charcoal is fast and gestural – it’s textured and opaque. Oil is gradual and easy – it may be as thick or skinny as I want it to be. The mixture permits me to succeed in the vary I need in my work.

Josephine: Do you’re employed from a reference? Inform us extra about your course of.

Hanna: I work from many references in my work. I start with analysis – trying via my favorite artwork books, Renaissance and Baroque work, and something particular I could also be excited about on the time – for instance, Henry Fuseli’s The Nightmare someday or Gustave Courbet’s The Wrestler the following. I then drag photos into Photoshop and start cropping and collaging them collectively till I’ve a composition that feels thrilling. This normally means a barely claustrophobic, overlapping of physique elements, which supplies a complexity of emotions.

Josephine: Do you frequently draw or preserve a sketchbook? In that case, how does this inform your work?

Hanna: I don’t preserve a sketchbook, however I do make small charcoal drawings of every portray that I make. That is just like a sketchbook, however they stay individually, scattered round my studio. Fast, gestural sketches assist me to resolve compositional challenges that come up throughout my portray.

Josephine: Have you ever ever had a interval of stagnation in creativity? In that case, what helped you overcome it?

Hanna: Sure, I actually have. This occurs to me when I’m focusing a lot on a day job that I’ve little capability left to offer to my studio follow. One of the best ways for me to beat this has been to make time to go see artwork. In these moments of stagnation, turning into impressed by others helps me to really feel so enthusiastic about artwork making that I need to get again into my studio.

Josephine: Are there any particular artists or mentors who’ve impressed you?

Hanna: So many! I’ve an extended checklist of feminine painters, particularly, that I revisit again and again. To call some: Jennifer Packer, Alice Neel, Artemisia Gentileschi, Cecily Brown, Marlene Dumas.

Josephine: What had been you excited about or exploring on the time you made I Woke Up Embarrassed With a Ache in My Head? What impressed it, and the way did it come to be?

Hanna: This piece started from a cropped portion of Peter Paul Rubens’ Samson and Delilah, the place one determine collapses over the lap of one other, whereas another person cuts a lock of the defeated determine’s hair. I used to be intrigued by the presence of intimacy, vulnerability, and dominance. Experiences which may really feel like binaries or polarities – care vs. violence, belief vs. manipulation – I discover are literally intertwined. I paint to seize this complexity.

I targeted on the features of the determine that evoke these senses, the arms, the scissors, the braid, the burden of the figures and the composition of them stacking on prime of each other. Within the reference portray, we see a second between two individuals in love. They’re partially unclothed, implying a vulnerability, and their our bodies gently maintain each other. On the identical time, we see that they’re in ache. The bodily collapse and weight of figures indicate an emotional heaviness, and there are troopers within the background foreshadowing the second when Samson is taken away from Delilah by drive. I reinterpreted this portray via the collage of private photos, cropped and composed onto the historic portray. I reimagined the second in inexperienced – a bodily, mucus-like color that washes over the piece.

Josephine: What made you submit this piece to Jackson’s Artwork Prize?

Hanna: This work felt most recent and pressing inside my studio on the time. It held the multitude of concepts that I used to be exploring, and was in a palette that mirrored its that means, each of the pure physique and imitating a toxicity.

Josephine: What impressed your use of inexperienced in I Woke Up Embarrassed With a Ache in My Head? Which greens did you employ for this piece?

Hanna: I sometimes lean in the direction of pinks when portray, as I take into consideration what’s beneath the pores and skin or the floor of the physique. This considering introduced me to acidic, or mucus, inexperienced. A color that, to me, like pink, holds each a magnificence and a grotesque when referencing the physique. Certainly one of my favorite oil colors is Williamsburg Oil’s Inexperienced Gold. Relying on the thickness and opacity through which it’s utilized, it will probably vary from a yellow hue to a real inexperienced.

Josephine: Eleanor Johnson talked about perceiving a ‘quiet however unmistakable violence’ within the act of chopping the determine’s braid depicted on this portray. Is that this a theme you resonate with, and does it thread via extra of your work?

Hanna: This positively resonates with me, and it’s a central theme all through my follow. In references, I search for moments that could be interpreted as concurrently violent and intimate. I paint an entanglement that stems from a historical past of perpetuated violence in our tradition. Lots of my references date again to the Renaissance, however the violence that I see in these photos is simply as related immediately. The overlapping our bodies in my work don’t merely signify interpersonal relationships; additionally they mirror how our bodies have been used to navigate and uphold broader social and political buildings. Contact turns into a web site the place intimacy, violence, and energy stay entangled. On this occasion, the chopping of hair may be seen as an act of kindness and a focus, or it could possibly be a logo of an influence dynamic and management.

Josephine: How did it really feel to maneuver via the levels of the competitors and win Eleanor Johnson’s Alternative Award?

Hanna: This was such an thrilling course of to be part of. I had watched video interviews with earlier winners and felt moved by Eleanor Johnson’s particularly! Discovering out that she was the juror who selected my work made this much more particular.

Josephine: Are there any new supplies or concepts you’re excited to discover utilizing your prize?

Hanna: I’m thrilled to have the ability to buy new oil colors! I’ve been counting on a specific palette for this previous yr or so in graduate faculty, and I’ll use the prize to discover new colors, mixing, and pairing of tones. As well as, I plan to attempt new oil mediums and hope to make discoveries via thinning and thickening methods.

Josephine: What’s developing subsequent for you?

Hanna: This summer time, I might be travelling to Los Angeles to check Baroque and Renaissance works on the Getty Institute. Right here, I hope to collect extra references and inspiration for my subsequent physique of labor, which is able to make up my Graduate thesis exhibition. I will even be attending a residency, the Ranch Residency, in northern New Mexico this upcoming July.

Observe Hanna on Instagram
Go to Hanna’s web site

Additional Studying

Jackson’s Artwork Prize 2026 First Prize Winner Introduced

Meet Eleanor Johnson, Winner of Jackson’s Artwork Prize 2025

How We Collaborate With Artists

Professional Recommendation on Making Your Method as an Artist

Store Oil Portray on jacksonsart.com