Jill O'Bryan Art

Jill O'Bryan Art

  • EXHIBITIONS
    • "A New Breath", Pie Projects Contemporary Art, Santa Fe
    • "Breathing into the Moon / Drawing on the Ground," Rule Gallery, Denver
    • "Mapping Resonance", CCA Santa Fe
    • "Jill O'Bryan" [TXST] Galleries, Texas State U, San Marcos, TX
    • "Breathing into the Elements", Zane Bennett Contemporary Art, Santa Fe
    • "Breath Taking", New Mexico Museum of Art, Santa Fe
    • "Jill O'Bryan: New Works," Margarete Roeder Gallery, NYC
    • "one billion breaths", Phillips Collection, Washington DC
    • "rock, paper, breath", Gallery Joe, Philadelphia
    • Uruboros Dance in "Mapping Resonance", CCA, Santa Fe
  • SITE SPECIFIC INSTALLATIONS
    • "7.8 billion of us breathing together..."
    • A Particular Kind Of Solitude, NYC
    • A Place To Which We Can Come, Brooklyn, 2012
    • "To breathe..." in Las Vegas, NM
    • Take a billion breaths
  • ARTWORK
    • Ground Paintings + Mineral Painting
    • Element Paintings
    • Desert Frottage
    • Desert Frottage (squares)
    • on, and just above ground
    • Metate Paintings
    • Philosopher Stones
    • mind and body inseparable from spirit
    • Tonglen Breath Drawings
    • Archived Breath Drawings
    • Two Halves of the Moon; The Shape of the Sound of a Breath
    • Breathing into the Moon, Series I
    • Breathing into the Moon, Series III
    • 2020 Quarantine Drawings
    • Geometry of Breath Drawings
    • Early Drawings
    • Artist Books
      • Breaths #1
      • Circles #3
      • Desert #2
  • ABOUT
    • ABOUT
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    • Writing
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For George Floyd
2020
Holy dirt from El Santuario de Chimayo rubbed into rice paper for 8 minutes, 46 seconds, and glass vial containing the left over holy dirt.
8 x 9.5 inches; framed: 12 x 12 inches

On May 25, 2020, George Floyd Jr. was murdered in Minneapolis by a police officer while he was under arrest. The officer knelt on Floyd’s neck for a reported 8 minutes and 46 seconds. George Floyd's death sparked numerous protests and demonstrations calling for renewed attention to systemic racism in the United States and the inequitable treatment of people of color by law enforcement. Reflecting on Floyd’s death, I created two drawings while thinking about Floyd and the duration of time he gasped for air. Here, I mark the paper for 8 minutes and 46 seconds, using “holy dirt” from northern New Mexico’s El Sanctuario de Chimayó (famous for its healing power), while thinking about the terrible interval in which his breath was taken. 


All images copyright Jill O'Bryan

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