About

Artist Statement

My work explores the complicated dimensionality of skin, the protective envelope of our volatile flesh. Skin is a permeable entity, a self-reflexive organ that through social, cultural, or physical contact can mediate and filter our experiences. Skin is never static—it is always changing, growing, or decaying. Paradoxically, it shields our innermost selves and yet, it makes us vulnerable to harm. Through organic structures that echo the internal and external body, my work investigates the discomfort of inhabiting skin and the challenges that come with this mutable flesh.

Like skin, my practice is in a constant state of change and mutation. It filters, mediates, and replicates my experiences. The imagery in my work oscillates between representation and abstraction, reflecting my ever-shifting relationship to image. My process is intuitive; the skin I paint mirrors the reactivity of my own skin as I enter the studio. In addition to this intuitive image and mark-making, I employ a color palette of pinks, reds, and blues—the colors of the womb and my mother’s flesh—evoking the body’s interior landscape.

Alongside color, I emphasize form and volume, synthesizing them to create a haptic visuality—a sense of tangibility through optical illusion. This illusory tactility invites touch. By depicting fleshy folds and subtle color shifts, I seek to entice the viewer, provoking the desire to touch the painted mirage of skin. As a viewer navigates this tension, questions of what it means to be in/a body seep from the pores of the canvas.




BIO
Tiffany Hawkins (She/Her) is an Alabama-based artist, she earned her BFA in Painting and Drawing, and BA in Art History from the University of Alabama in Huntsville. She is currently earning her MFA in Painting from the University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa.