Julia Hames is a painter, material researcher, and gardener currently living in Brooklyn, NY. They have a BFA in painting from the Rhode Island School of Design with a concentration in nature, culture, and sustainability studies. Their practice revolves around a sensitivity to the natural world, experimenting with pigments, dyes, glass, biomaterials, and fibers. They have created their own poetic language with their paintings that captures the spiritual properties of the organic world, often using the bilateral symmetry found in living organisms as a source of inspiration. Otherworldly images are born from the close observation and scientific research of arthropods such as crabs, moths, and beetles. With their paintings, the viewer is embraced by luminous forms personifying the benevolence of nature and the cosmos. Their connection with nature also extends beyond the visual, as a key part of their practice is growing and foraging their own plants to use for material exploration. With the use of handmade paints and bio-substrates, their work rejects the notion of the archive and exists as a living organism as it changes from day to day. Hames acts not solely as an artist, but as a collaborator with the world they live in.
