“It’s Not Going to Happen Like That” and Other Paintings by Anna Conway

Anna Conway is an artist living and working in New York, NY. Her landscapes, interiors, and urbanscapes often depict individuals confronted with potentially disastrous situations. In her realist yet absurd paintings, issues of labor, race, masculinity, and catastrophe are metaphorically embodied by people (workers?) dwarfed by their surroundings.

According to Sarah Kessler: “As if attempting to harpoon a whale, they (the characters in her painting, note by FL) band together to tame a force much fiercer than the combination of their own powers, and the situations appear hopeless. Ironically, the force to be reckoned with is of man’s own creations, reflecting, in Conway’s words, a “culture characterized by disposability… despite overwhelming expenditure of all manners of resources“.

Yet, the big scenario is never explicit: epic tension is always balanced by the smaller gestures and memories inspiring Conway’s painting. As someone who has personally lived through hardship (her house was destroyed twice) the artist is able to elaborate a satirical work which is at once a commentary on late-stage Capitalism and a deep autobiographical narrative.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Further reading:

Anna Conway’s page on American Contemporary

All images © Anna Conway