Jessica Halonen

StatementCVExhibitionsPress

Jessica Halonen (b. 1972, Milford, MI) conducts extensive research for her works, delving into the intersections between art, science, and history. She has engaged with topics that include genetic engineering in the pharmaceutical industry and the historical and metaphorical implications of the color blue. Her newest paintings, which fuse abstraction and trompe l'oeil, are informed by a collection of toxic wallpaper samples published by the Michigan State Board of Health in 1874. The book warns of the hazardous particulate matter shed by these decorative papers that were printed with lead and arsenic based pigments typical of the time. These works were originally included in her solo exhibition in 2022 at testsite in Austin, with an accompanying essay by Kelly Baum, Curator of Contemporary Art at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.

Halonen earned her MFA in Painting from Washington University in St. Louis and has been an Artist-in-Residence at the MacDowell Colony, New Hampshire; Kunstlerhaus Bethanian, Berlin; Artpace, San Antonio; and the Core Program, Glassell School of Art, Museum of Fine Arts Houston. Her work has been included in numerous exhibitions, including at The Contemporary Austin, the Dallas Contemporary, the McNay Art Museum, the Tang Teaching Museum at Skidmore College, the Museum of Fine Arts Houston, and the Torrance Art Museum, Los Angeles. Her work is in the permanent collections of the Art Museum of South Texas, Fort Wayne Museum of Art, and the Museum of Fine Arts Houston. Halonen currently lives in Austin and works in San Antonio where she is an Associate Professor of Art at Trinity University.

Jessica Halonen; Specimen 41 & 42 (bouquets and marble), 2024; acrylic on panel; 20 x 16 inches
Jessica Halonen; Wallpaper 69 (landscape), 2022; acrylic on panel; 20 x 16 inches
Jessica Halonen; Specimen 29 (string), 2022; acrylic on panel; 20 x 16 inches
Jessica Halonen; Weather (Kanazawa Window 2), 2019; oil on linen; 30 x 40 inches
Jessica Halonen; Weather (Kanazawa Window 1), 2019; oil on canvas; 24 x 18 inches
Jessica Halonen; Oil Rainbow (Werner Avenue), 2019; oil on linen; 31 x 24 inches
Jessica Halonen; Remnant 2 (New Year's Gift Manet), 2019; Fresco on panel; 14 x 11 inches
Jessica Halonen; Overcast (Flowers After Manet), 2018-2019; acrylic on linen; 36 x 60 inches
Jessica Halonen; The Blue Hour (Flowers After Manet), 2019; acrylic on linen; 36 x 60 inches
Jessica Halonen; The Blue Hour 10 PM (Flowers After Manet), 2019; acrylic on linen; 36 x 60 inches
Jessica Halonen; Untitled (Invisible Ink), 2015; oil and colored pencil on panel; 30 x 24 in.
Jessica Halonen; Untitled (Black Bunting), 2015; oil on panel; 11 x 14 in.
Jessica Halonen; Untitled (Relic, Lapis Lazuli), 2015; oil on panel; 10 x 8 in.