ABOUT THE EXHIBITION

In the front gallery, Dallas-based artist Leigh Merrill’s Lost Pine, Double Pine brings the viewer into an alternate universe of mysterious cotton candy colors and echoes of reality. The exhibition includes works from her series, Garden of Artificial Sugar and Thesaurus of Air, which utilize digital collage techniques to reshape perception of natural and urban landscapes.

Through a painterly system of consistent color and texture, lush vegetation and geometric storefronts stretch farther from our familiarity while growing closer to one another. Merrill’s meticulous digital collages highlight a friction between the simultaneous visual reverence and physical encroachment of humankind with the existing landscape:

Familiar elements such as the lawn, manicured and manipulated plants, and new buildings that mimic other eras and locations, reveal a culture of perpetual longing. The urban landscape is often a post-modern offering of architecture, simulating or referencing different periods or locations. This simulation reveals the desire for what is referenced, and the majority of our landscapes - built for the car and continuous growth – embody an aspirational forward momentum within their infrastructure. My photographs and videos seek out this longing and desire while echoing the cultural, historical, and perceptual forces that impact our experience of place.