Kelli Scott Kelley: Accalia and the Swamp Monster

Jung Center of Houston presents the exhibition Kelli Scott Kelley: Accalia and the Swamp Monster. On view November 2-28. Opening Reception November 7, 5-7 pm.

Kelli Scott Kelley’s Accalia and the Swamp Monster features mixed media works, painted and drawn on re-purposed antique linens.

Kelley’s exhibition takes visitors on a surreal journey through a haunted southern landscape, one populated by swamp monsters and shadowed by our deepest thoughts and darkest nightmares.

Inspired by Kelley’s recently published book, Accalia and the Swamp Monster is both an entrancing display of Kelley’s art and an affirmation of the transformative power of fairy tales—a story of despair, atonement and transformation told in the whisper of a remembered bedtime story.

ARTIST STATEMENT:
Through personal and universal icons my work explores multiple states of reality. Symbolic figures, animals, and objects appear in narratives, which explore humankind’s connections, disconnections and impact upon the animal world. We love some animals and sweetly distort them in books to entertain and teach our children lessons. We also grow animals in inhumane conditions, slaughter them and cause their extinction. I appropriate images of animals from popular culture, taxidermy and hunting catalogs, natural history illustrations and other diverse sources to conjure images that reflect on this human and animal link.

Kelley, a professor of painting & drawing at the LSU School of Art, drew upon Roman mythology, Jungian analysis, and the psychology of fairy tales to create Accalia and the Swamp Monster, a deeply personal exhibition that speaks to the role of folklore and fairy tales in contemporary American life.