Each year, the Naples Art Institute hosts an artist in residence so that patrons can meet new artists and observe their creative processes. Now through Sept. 25, that artist is Jessie Perez. For more than two decades, she has used acrylic paint to explore themes of nature, emotion, and personal growth. Her paintings – of flowers, seashells and organic forms – encourage viewers to slow down, reflect and find beauty in the everyday.
Throughout her residency, Perez will create new work while engaging with the Naples community through open studio hours about creative process and the profound relationship she’s forged with the natural world.
MORE INFORMATION:
About artist residencies
Artist residencies are a growing trend in museums around the globe.
An artist residency is a temporary, application-based opportunity in which an artist is invited to work within a specific environment for a defined period – here, eight weeks. Host organizations range from museums, universities, and nonprofit arts organizations to independent initiatives, rural retreat centers, civic institutions and our national parks.
There are different forms of artist residencies. Some culminate in exhibitions. Others terminate in the development of a finished product. This one is an open studio format.
From the museum’s perspective, it enables NAI to present new, contemporary work to its regular patrons and visitors while creating buzz and social media content and publicity that attracts new audiences. From the artist’s vantage point, it provides Perez with access and exposure to those patrons who view her at work and engage her in conversation about her inspiration, creative process and studio practices.
Open studio artist residencies provide considerably more advantages to the artist than mere exposure. Being selected for a residency signals institutional trust and alignment. It functions as a form of endorsement that can influence future opportunities, funding decisions, and curatorial interest. It shapes how the artist interacts with both the host institution and the communities that support and patronize it.
As artsy.net claims that residencies are incubators for productivity, funding, forging relationships, and finding inspiration.
About Jessie Perez
Jessie Perez is a Naples native. Her love of nature continues to shape her work. Her practice is rooted in self-expression, intuition, and a deep trust in the creative process. Creativity has served as both a refuge and a way of navigating life’s many seasons, helping her process change and grief through making art. Through her paintings, she offers a lens for admiring the beauty found in everyday objects and the subtle ways they connect us.
She groups her work into three interrelated series: Honey, Flowers and Shell Studies.
The paintings in Honey depict flowers and flower petals oozing golden brown nectar. Some of the titles in this series are “Blue Iris,” “Presence,” “The Lovers,” “White Orchid” and “Pink Ranunculus.”
Her Flowers series also includes plenty of honey, including “Honey Orchid,” “Honey Anthurium” and “Honey Rose.”
Shell Studies includes numbered shells of various colors and descriptions.
All are painted in a realist/photorealist style.
Support for WGCU’s arts & culture reporting comes from the Estate of Myra Janco Daniels, the Charles M. and Joan R. Taylor Foundation, and Naomi Bloom in loving memory of her husband, Ron Wallace.
