Today we’d like to introduce you to Jeralyn Victoria Mohr.
Jeralyn Victoria, we’d love to hear your story and how you got to where you are today both personally and as an artist.
I identified as an artist since my childhood in North Dakota, so I never questioned what my role or passion was, but gradually learned it was a source of power that would ground me for the rest of my life.
I think the sometimes extreme climate and minimalist landscape there helped mold my sense of play and industry. When there are external limitations, it can force a person to live a rich creative inner life! I have used that creative process of research, analysis and visual metaphor throughout all life experience.
Through loss of important mentors, sexual assault and cancer that took my mom at a young age it was that creative process of looking inward that has allowed a practice of resilience. I have been fortunate to collaborate with other artists and practitioners that treat trauma and chronic pain to be able to incorporate visual data and PTSD treatment modalities such as EMDR in my artwork, patterns and textiles. My work over the decades has chronicled that inner space that adversity and healing occupies.
We’d love to hear more about your art. What do you do and why and what do you hope others will take away from your work?
My work is called Inner Space. Through the visual metaphor of outer space, I explore the inner landscape of trauma and resilience. Inner Space documents looking inward to process, using the work as a location for the exchange of challenging, but healing dialogue. I use drawing, painting, diorama in miniature, sculpture, photography and incorporate PTSD treatment methods such as EMDR and visual data related to ways the body handles chronic stress in my textiles and patterning. These are all unified by the visual themes of gravity, suspended states, celestial bodies and space exploring hero figures. Space becomes a metaphorical environment, an area rich with personal mythology and the place of a hero’s journey. The body becomes a storage site for these experiences. Shame and secrecy keep the truth from being processed, as this stored experience, unaddressed, can become chronic illness standing in the way of integration and healing. So when this work became wearable, it was quite organic and only a matter of time that the body would become the location for the work to be seen. By translating these metaphors into fashion, I literally create a space for these personal narratives to be external, not just internal. I often create pieces by imagining what the hero figures I’ve developed might wear (such as Flowernaut, Space Sheriff, Spicygirl, Sparklenaut or Astro Femme)!
What do you know now that you wished you had learned earlier?
I’m not interested in using art to escape or avoid, I think an artist’s job is to challenge traditions and examine the world on a level that is deeply beyond face value. Though art can be entertaining, it’s not its goal. That all being said, it makes it a bit harder to find people with the insight and curiosity to appreciate that point of view and we don’t have to accept the limitations of relationships that are limiting or have run their course…we can rebuild intentional community around new, truer boundaries at any time!
Do you have any events or exhibitions coming up? Where would one go to see more of your work? How can people support you and your artwork?
The most live experience of my process is via Instagram and my seasonal trunk shows. The trunk shows are essentially an interactive art exhibit where people can try on and buy the pieces in person and there is intentional space created for dialogue around the concept behind each piece and room for the wearer to connect to these themes. I always invite people to share and build community on Instagram if they are comfortable so there is a very collaborative nature to this work. Ironically, the more personal it gets, the more universal it has become!
Contact Info:
- Website: ArtistMN.com
- Phone: 6514425596
- Email: info@artistmn.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/artistmn/
- Facebook: https://m.facebook.com/artistmnjeralynmohr/
Image Credit:
(Personal Photo only) per Jeannine Marie photography @
https://www.jeanninemarie.com/
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