brief encounter

Misty Bennett, John Paul Kesling, Sarah West

May 6-20, 2023

Misty Bennett is a visual artist whose paintings combine realism and abstraction through the lens of kaleidoscopic color, pattern, and texture. In her current body of work, beauty and repulsion are interconnected, leading the viewer to experience many different feelings at once as they form connections between food-inspired forms. Her work has been exhibited across the Southeast, most recently in the Red Clay Survey at the Huntsville Museum of Art and at the Tennessee Valley Art Museum. It is also featured in collections including the Carmichael Library at the University of Montevallo, the Alabama State Council on the Arts, and the President’s Collection at the University of Georgia. Bennett received her BFA from the Savannah College of Art and Design and her MFA from the University of Georgia. She teaches painting and serves as Art Department Chair at the University of Montevallo, and lives in Vestavia Hills, AL.

John Paul Kesling is a painter whose practice delves into the complexities of human intimacy and connection. Driven by a need to understand the world around him, Kesling's paintings serve as a visual exploration of the emotional and psychological intricacies of intimate relationships, personal loss, and our place in the natural world. Kesling, now based in Nashville, was born and raised in Northeastern Kentucky in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains. He received his BFA from Morehead State University and his MFA from the Savannah College of Art and Design. He has had recent solo shows at Wheelhouse Arts (Louisville, KY), Oz Arts (Nashville, TN), and The Red Arrow Gallery (Nashville, TN). Kesling is a member of the artist collective Ground Floor Contemporary (Birmingham, AL), and is represented by The Red Arrow Gallery (Nashville, TN) and Wheelhouse Art (Louisville, KY).

Sarah West is an artist whose work examines our persistent desire to be transported by visual means and explores ways the spiritual realm has been represented in the past and today. West’s recent body of work aligns Early Renaissance painting compositions and digital spaces in their shared role as dream space/site of spiritual quests. The resulting paintings evoke a divine encounter, reflecting on both the religious subject matter referenced in Renaissance sources and the mystical aura surrounding new technologies. West was featured in the South 2016 edition of the juried art publication New American Paintings, and she received a BFA in Studio Art from Wake Forest University and an MFA from Clemson University. She has taught painting and drawing courses at Clemson University and Columbus State University, and currently lives and works in Birmingham, AL.