THE BEHELD BEINGS | Glynnis Reed

The Beheld Beings explores the (de)materialization of physical form through mixed media portraits interlaced with imagery of plants, palm tree leaves and water. I began my compositions with elegant photo portraits of Black women made abstract through the digital layering of images of natural landscapes. The images dissolve as I draw layers of lines and stippled dots on the inkjet print with black, white and color India ink brush pens. I create these pieces through an integration of photography, inkjet printing and drawing; photographs crucially form the foundation of the artworks from this series. My drawings reveal emergent beings uncovered from the vestiges of a hidden underlying photography. These works convey abjection circumscribed by divine beauty; they release the heavy weight of depression.

Glynnis Reed is an accomplished visual artist, art educator and emerging scholar. She is currently a fourth- semester doctoral candidate in Art Education & Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies at the Pennsylvania State University. Her scholarly activities weave multiple strands of study that include artmaking practices, African diasporic spirituality, and neurodivergence to produce art education curriculum and pedagogy from Black feminist perspectives. Her studio art practice has moved from exploration of the urban landscape to natural environments that become settings for figurative compositions and lyrical portraits. She composes narratives of love and loss, fulfillment and emptiness and shadow and light through the mediums of photography, digital collage, analog collage, drawing, painting and poetry. View her art at glynnisreed.com.

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