Artist Statement
I make lists.
At night, before I go to sleep.
Exhaustion.
Confronting my feelings of guilt, shame, loneliness while examining generational mental illness in these spaces are at the core of my being.
Quiet, sometimes calm.
I have long been interested in using abstract images and multimedia to investigate gendered and sexualized experiences.
I am motivated by a profound anger about the treatment of women in both historical and contemporary social contexts through violence, marginalization, discrimination, and bias. That anger is matched by my awe of how women exist in domestic spaces.
The peace, the quiet, the chaos. Care.
I inhabit this dialect through multiple artistic disciplines. The work provides a window into small moments, partially formed memories, and minor feelings within those existences. It investigates the dependence on the labor of motherhood.
Biography
Born and raised in San Diego, CA, Kelly Marshall now resides in Seattle, WA with her family. As a multidisciplinary project-based artist, she creates a range of work centered around concepts of maternal exhaustion, invisible labor, and minor feelings in domestic spaces. She followed her BA in Applied Art and Design from San Diego State University with a career as an educator and owner of Color, Construct Create Studios. Marshall holds a Masters Degree in Special Education and an MFA in Visual Studies from Pacific Northwest College of Art. Marshall’s exhibition/publication history includes The Jen Tough Gallery, Santa Fe, NM; The Visionary Projects, NY; Shockboxx Project, Hermosa Beach, CA; Artist/Mother Network, Juried Exhibition; Roaring Artist Gallery; Maternal Art Magazine; and The Front Arte & Cultura, San Ysidro, CA. She has been artist-in residence at the Stay Home Gallery in Paris, TN and is the Director of Learning Resources at The Northwest School for the Arts in Seattle, WA.