JO DENNIS

A Glass of Absinthe

Curated by Elisa Carollo

JO-HS Gallery is thrilled to present Jo Dennis' show, A Glass of Absinthe, an exhibition curated by Elisa Carollo.

Jo Dennis’ works are profoundly anchored in the fabric of life. Her paintings pull back and forth between physical experience and a more subconscious and transcendental memorial dimension in which an image can manifest. Dennis often integrates everyday elements into her works, anchoring them once again in a material realm of actual experience. The traces left on the surface become remnants of past events and occasions for ruminations on something already absent or lost. Layer after layer, a dense stratification of marks and gestures accumulates intuitively on used military tent fabrics. Chosen as a substrate for its relation to the body, their materiality transforms the painting process into a powerful metaphor for the layering of sensations, emotions, and memories that determine our experience of the world.

In this way, embodying a temporal and experimental dimension, Dennis’s works become a kind of diary that reflects the complex interplay between physical actions and psychological reactions that shape our existential experience.

Building on the Cubist and Dadaist pioneering inclusion of ordinary objects into artworks to integrate the abstraction of painterly gestures, Dennis delves into the relationship between human stories and material culture, all while threading them into the continuum of art history. The title of the show, Glass of Absinthe, draws directly from Picasso’s homonymous sculpture, in which the artist included a real absinthe spoon nestled between the modeled bronze sugar cube and glass. Viscerally sensuous and highly evocative, Dennis’s dense, tactile meditations ultimately become embodiments of real-life experiences, embracing a notion of materiality that transcends its direct physical presence to include all the experiential, memorial, and cultural meanings embedded within the painting.

- Elisa Carollo

Artist’s Bio

Jo Dennis

Jo Dennis (b 1973, UK) is a British artist based in London. Her practice spans two decades working across painting, sculpture, photography, and installation. Dennis explores our emotional connection to place and memory, specifically in relation to ruination, surface, and decay, and how these themes link with notions of mortality. Dennis received her MA Painting at The Royal College of Art London (2022) and BA Fine Art and Contemporary Critical Theory at Goldsmiths College London (2002). Upcoming exhibitions; JO-HS (solo), Mexico City and Belenius Gallery in Stockholm. Recent exhibitions include; Across the Pond, Eric Firestone Gallery, NYC; Dallas Art Fair 2024, PM/AM Gallery (solo booth); Town Hall Disco, Newchild Gallery, Antwerp, Belgium, 2024 (solo); Matter, Flowers Gallery, London, 2023 (curator and artist); Absent without Leave, Sid Motion Gallery, 2022 (solo) Ares, OHSH Projects, Cromwell Place, London, 2023; Positions, Alma Pearl Gallery, London, 2023. Dennis is a recipient of a Grants for the Arts from Arts Council England 2023-24. She is the co-founder of several artist lead projects in London; Pigeon Park (2021-22) Peckham 24 Photo Festival (2016 - 2024) AMP Gallery (2015 - 2018) and Asylum Chapel (2010 - current) She has collaborated with Sid Motion Gallery on five solo projects (2017-2023) including the launch of her first artists book ‘I touched this with my hand, I touched that with my eye’ (2020) Dennis’ work is part of the TiA Collection, Santa Fe, the Soho House collection and numerous private collections. Her work was recently included in ’The Book Of Ladders, 100 Contemporary Art Works’ edited by Paul Carey Kent and Adeline de Monseignat 2023, and ’Site Specific’ by Tall Poppy Press 2023.

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