Elizabeth Priller
Artist Statement - Elizabeth Priller, 1980, Freeport, IL. Chicago, IL. native.
The Space Between Exhibit:
My work explores the space between what is visible and what is experienced, how identity, memory, perception, and change shape the ways we understand ourselves and one another. I am drawn to moments of transition, when something familiar begins to shift and we find ourselves somewhere between what was and what comes next.
In my Sound Wave pieces, Resonance and Transmission, I draw from my own experience with traumatic brain injury and neurodivergence, exploring altered perception, sensory processing, memory, interruption, and the invisible ways experience moves through the mind and body. I transmitted actual sound waves through wet mineral watercolor pigments, physically moving the paint as each portrait emerges. The resulting patterns could not be controlled or replicated, creating visual records of vibration and sensory experience. The recognizable figure remains while the paint moves beyond it, reflecting the difference between what can be seen from the outside and what may be experienced within.
In What Remains / What Is Possible, I turned that exploration toward motherhood, identity, and the experience of watching my daughters move through different stages of becoming. The watercolor portraits are modeled after my daughters and reflect both who I see them as today and the memories I carry of who they have been. What Remains considers the qualities, experiences, and connections that endure through change, while What Is Possible looks toward the uncertainty and openness of a life still unfolding. For these works, I introduced Castile soap into wet watercolor to create organic granulating blooms that disrupt the movement of pigment. The process evokes cleansing, release, nature, and transformation, allowing the paint to break apart and form something I could not completely predict. This physical disruption became a metaphor for transition itself: some things can be guided, but not controlled; some things must be released for something new to emerge.
Across both collections, I embrace the tension between control and surrender, permanence and change, the visible and the unseen. The paintings occupy that space, where identities evolve, perceptions shift, and we learn to make room for what remains while allowing ourselves to discover what is possible.
The Space Between Exhibit:
My work explores the space between what is visible and what is experienced, how identity, memory, perception, and change shape the ways we understand ourselves and one another. I am drawn to moments of transition, when something familiar begins to shift and we find ourselves somewhere between what was and what comes next.
In my Sound Wave pieces, Resonance and Transmission, I draw from my own experience with traumatic brain injury and neurodivergence, exploring altered perception, sensory processing, memory, interruption, and the invisible ways experience moves through the mind and body. I transmitted actual sound waves through wet mineral watercolor pigments, physically moving the paint as each portrait emerges. The resulting patterns could not be controlled or replicated, creating visual records of vibration and sensory experience. The recognizable figure remains while the paint moves beyond it, reflecting the difference between what can be seen from the outside and what may be experienced within.
In What Remains / What Is Possible, I turned that exploration toward motherhood, identity, and the experience of watching my daughters move through different stages of becoming. The watercolor portraits are modeled after my daughters and reflect both who I see them as today and the memories I carry of who they have been. What Remains considers the qualities, experiences, and connections that endure through change, while What Is Possible looks toward the uncertainty and openness of a life still unfolding. For these works, I introduced Castile soap into wet watercolor to create organic granulating blooms that disrupt the movement of pigment. The process evokes cleansing, release, nature, and transformation, allowing the paint to break apart and form something I could not completely predict. This physical disruption became a metaphor for transition itself: some things can be guided, but not controlled; some things must be released for something new to emerge.
Across both collections, I embrace the tension between control and surrender, permanence and change, the visible and the unseen. The paintings occupy that space, where identities evolve, perceptions shift, and we learn to make room for what remains while allowing ourselves to discover what is possible.
