Sara Anstis

Sara Anstis primarily works with pastels on paper to render dreamlike tableaux. Using the hazy nature of pastels to her advantage, Anstis draws inspiration from art history, mythology, and folklore to softly bring recognisable narratives and figures into view. The women she depicts could have been plucked from Botticelli paintings, their classical beauty delivered in an Early Renaissance painterly style. Doting mythological creatures embrace these ethereal figures, with petals and other fauna surrounding them. All of these components seem to be shuffled from different tales or eras, rebound in a new realm cultivated by Anstis. In her own words, her practice ‘dwells in half-narratives’, there’s both comfort and a sense of unease in her oeuvre. Each work pulls the viewer in and disrupts what you may have initially expected, characters are mixed up and re-appear across different drawings. In this way, the stories spun by Anstis complicate fables or art historical narratives you may have previously been told. The artist will sometimes also add an additional layer of line drawings on top of the pastel surface, weaving in characters and figures in a more distinct register. This blending of visual styles furthers the destabilising quality established in Anstis’s practice, while each piece remains utterly enrapturing to the eye. ...

Various Small Fires (Los Angeles /Dallas /Seoul) began as a series of conversations with artists and curators in Esther Kim Varet’s Venice Beach kitchen while working on her doctoral dissertation. VSF debuted in Hollywood as an official gallery in 2015 with a roster of artists and its current Johnston MarkLee Architects-designed building. The Hollywood gallery contains three exhibition spaces, a unique sound corridor, and an outdoor gallery. VSF’s exhibition program explores several curatorial lines: climate, equality, and an international conversation. The gallery is known for offering artists debut shows, creating intergenerational conversations among the artists on its roster, and solidifying artists’ legacies within art history. In 2019, VSF opened a second location in the Hannam neighbourhood of Seoul, South Korea, followed recently this Spring by VSFs third outpost in Dallas, Texas. While Varet has very personal connections to both locations, they are also superlative art communities. These expansions emphasise the gallery’s commitment to innovation and global dialogue in the twenty-first century. In 2021, VSF became a member of the Art Dealers Association of America (ADAA). ...