Artist Statement
American Archive 2026 is a multidisciplinary record of lived experience assembled through observation rather than conclusion. As the United States approaches its 250th anniversary, the work reflects a moment shaped by division, uncertainty, and persistence. These images function as visual footnotes. They are fragments of attention gathered from daily life and held without resolution.
My practice begins with line. I construct fault lines that divide and rejoin space, color, texture, and form. Surfaces are built, disrupted, and revised; sketches return at different stages of their own existence. The work develops through listening as much as making. I do not aim to resolve an image but to release it to the conditions that shaped it.
Figures in this archive record pressure placed upon the body: social, economic, historical. Landscapes record what endures beyond immediate conflict. These environments are not escapes; they are sites of continuity, repair, and unguarded presence. Together they hold rupture and restoration within the same field.
Revisiting earlier work has become a form of record keeping. Questions asked in the past remain partially answered. What emerges is not a fixed body of work but an ongoing document of response. This body of work represents a practice of witnessing shaped by attention, uncertainty, and persistence.
This archive remains provisional. It is not a conclusion. It is a record of looking.
Artist Bio
Jessica McGarry Bartlet is a professional artist based in Connecticut. She attended Eastern Michigan University and received a BFA with a concentration in Drawing in 2005. In 2007 she participated in a drawing marathon with Graham Nickson at the New York Studio School. She went on to earn an MFA in painting from Western Connecticut State University in 2009 with Margaret Grimes. She held a residency at the Vermont Studio Center in the spring of 2010. That same year, Bartlet joined First Street Gallery, an artist-run gallery in New York City and currently serves on the board. She teaches art history and painting at Post University and Naugatuck Valley Community College. She is a founding member of the New Hartford Artisans Guild, and published her first book, Backyard Wilderness, in 2024.
American Archive 2026 is a multidisciplinary record of lived experience assembled through observation rather than conclusion. As the United States approaches its 250th anniversary, the work reflects a moment shaped by division, uncertainty, and persistence. These images function as visual footnotes. They are fragments of attention gathered from daily life and held without resolution.
My practice begins with line. I construct fault lines that divide and rejoin space, color, texture, and form. Surfaces are built, disrupted, and revised; sketches return at different stages of their own existence. The work develops through listening as much as making. I do not aim to resolve an image but to release it to the conditions that shaped it.
Figures in this archive record pressure placed upon the body: social, economic, historical. Landscapes record what endures beyond immediate conflict. These environments are not escapes; they are sites of continuity, repair, and unguarded presence. Together they hold rupture and restoration within the same field.
Revisiting earlier work has become a form of record keeping. Questions asked in the past remain partially answered. What emerges is not a fixed body of work but an ongoing document of response. This body of work represents a practice of witnessing shaped by attention, uncertainty, and persistence.
This archive remains provisional. It is not a conclusion. It is a record of looking.
Artist Bio
Jessica McGarry Bartlet is a professional artist based in Connecticut. She attended Eastern Michigan University and received a BFA with a concentration in Drawing in 2005. In 2007 she participated in a drawing marathon with Graham Nickson at the New York Studio School. She went on to earn an MFA in painting from Western Connecticut State University in 2009 with Margaret Grimes. She held a residency at the Vermont Studio Center in the spring of 2010. That same year, Bartlet joined First Street Gallery, an artist-run gallery in New York City and currently serves on the board. She teaches art history and painting at Post University and Naugatuck Valley Community College. She is a founding member of the New Hartford Artisans Guild, and published her first book, Backyard Wilderness, in 2024.
