During the pandemic, I made dozens of ink drawings like these. They speak to the ubiquity of screens in daily life (especially during lockdown), and the tumultuous feeling of that time, with the country rocked not only by COVID-19, but also by racial justice protests in the wake of George Floyd's murder. Born of that roiling moment, these drawings reflect on America as a complex space, layered with different dynamics. The process of making the work helped me cope with my own feelings of distress and lost control, as the pandemic upended my graduate program, jobs, and future plans.

Biography

Julia Clift is a Philadelphia-based artist using painting, drawing, and collage to grapple with Anthropocentric ways of thinking, American culture, the expanding role of digital technology in daily life, and her own mediated perceptions of reality. Her work has been widely exhibited throughout the United States and is held in permanent collections at Wythe Hotel (Brooklyn, NY) and Penn Medicine’s Clifton Center for Medical Breakthroughs (Philadelphia, PA). A passionate educator, Clift has taught painting and drawing at The Pennsylvania State University, Tyler School of Art and Architecture, Maryland Institute College of Art, and West Chester University. At Sidney Kimmel Medical College at Thomas Jefferson University, she co-created and continues to teach Visualizing Anatomy, a course that deepens medical students’ understanding of anatomy through visual arts curriculum. She received her BFA from Washington University in St. Louis and her MFA from Tyler School of Art and Architecture, Temple University.