Jen Davis: New Photographs  

Body-image issues, self perception and attraction are explored in New Photographs by Jen Davis, the subject of a solo show at the Indianapolis Museum of Contemporary Art (iMOCA) May 8 through July 25. Images available upon request. Davis' self-portraits evaluate her self-image as an overweight female in her late 20s dealing with the pressures and expectations of the outside world, while her photographs of men create an intimacy with her subjects that she yearns for and does not have emotionally or physically. Her work has been described as ranging from sensuality full of rich colors to a tense scrutiny of her isolation.
 
In her self-portraits, "I deal with my insecurities about my body image and the direct correlation between self-perception and the way one is perceived by others," said Davis, an Akron native who received her MFA in Photography from Yale University School of Art in 2008. With her photographs of men, "I am interested in investigating the male gaze not as a theoretical abstraction, but as a personal and sexual exchange," she said. "Every frame is a record of a hypothetical and fictional relationship that formed between us … a visual record of not what actually took place, but what I imagined it to be."
 
Davis is the recipient of an Illinois Arts Council Artist Fellowship Award, a Community Arts Assistance Program Grant through The Department of Cultural Affairs, and two Albert P. Weisman Memorial Scholarships.
 
In 2005 Davis had two solo exhibitions: "Jen Davis: Recent Photographs at " Texas Woman's University Fine Arts Gallery, Denton; and "Self-Image," Photo Passage at Harbourfront Centre, Toronto, Canada.   In 2008 her work was included in exhibitions at major museums and collections in the US—Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; Bank of America LaSalle Collection, Chicago; Milwaukee Art Museum; and Yale University School of Art.  Additional permanent collections include the Art Institute of Chicago; Cleveland Museum of Art; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; Allen Memorial Art Museum, Oberlin; Toledo Museum of Art, Ohio; and the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond.