Part of the exhilaration Janna Watson acquires from painting is being able to see shifts within herself manifested into a physical reality. The most truthful form of expression she has found in her life this far has been the abstract language of painting.

Self discovery is fluid and when she is painting she can see worlds within herself taking shape across their varied surfaces. When the act of looking creates optical overload, the viewer is led back to the concrete realities of colour, pigment and the relief of negative space. Fields of watery pigment-stained panels have been created as intermediate moments that unify the process of creation. The paintings speak on their own emotional terms that evade logic and invite limitless interpretations.

Raised in the '80s in a rural area without internet or TV, Watson had little exposure to foreign languages. Her father was a Pentecostal pastor and her earliest memory of a “foreign” language was the speaking of tongues. She was taught that praying in tongues was a way to bypass the mind and communicate a divinely inspired language with an utterance of the spirit.

This early understanding of using language to bypass words has been deeply imprinted on her and it has since manifested itself in new ways, influencing her abstract expression.

Following the opening reception, the exhibit will be on display through November 4.