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Underscored by her improvisational techniques and an overriding feeling of immediacy due to a cancer diagnosis, Julia Jalowiec (B.F.A. ’18) reveals a preoccupation with mortality and absence in her exhibition In a Rush. She transforms subjects into symbols of courage and stability. Her work, marked by motifs like helmets and goggles, reframes personal experiences of illness and disability into narratives of protection and triumph, embodying her refusal to be defined by limitations.

In Jalowiec’s art, improvisation is essential. Subjects begin from something familiar, then branch off suddenly toward other worlds. Mark-making is fast and unfussy; methods and materials are often spontaneous. Her cast of characters possess superhero attributes like confidence, strength, and vitality, leading to fairytale endings. These subjects and methods are not naive; rather, Jalowiec’s acute awareness of her mortality demanded urgency and transformation.

Aitor Lajarin-Encina (B.F.A. University of Basque Country, Bilbao; M.F.A. University of California, San Diego) is a Spanish an artist, educator and organizer currently living in Fort Collins, CO. He is the assistant professor of painting in the Department of Art and Art History at Colorado State University, where he teaches painting, drawing and socially engaged art practice courses.

Lajarin-Encina’s Big Wave collection is a body of work that has an intense, immersive quality, and thick existential atmosphere, and draws the viewer into the various dreamy scenes where strange, odd, mysterious events and situations unfold and occur. They, like most of his paintings, are visual poems that invite viewers to dive into vignettes of existential suspense that aim to trigger philosophical ruminations about life, interpersonal relationships and relationships with the environment.

Learn more about the artist here: /meadows/areasofstudy/art/lectureseries.