By its very definition, portraiture is the portrayal of a specific individual. Across a variety of media, this genre has been used historically for the expression of sentiment, posterity and status. Portraits draw upon the personality and mood of the sitter and use a common visual language that sets distinct expectations for the target audience. So what happens to this dialogue when an artist makes portraits of no one person in particular?

This March, Foster/White brings together a selection of artists who use portraiture to examine a diverse range of subjects including cultural identity, societal acceptance and self-definition. We are very excited to debut three exceptional artists whom we are showing for the first time: Erin Armstrong, Carlos Donjuan and Julia Lambright.

Donjuan uses his own personal narrative as a first generation American to address perceptions of immigration and acceptance. His masked figures are meant to be playful and approachable, rather than a faceless threat. Armstrong deliberately avoids strict lines and barriers in her work so that her subjects can exist in the space between dream and reality. Her figures, comprised of bold strokes of color, embody intangible ideas of memory, sensation and imagination. Lambright mines the past for images, ideas and symbols relating to self and society. She brings them together in cohesive layers to form a reconstructed narrative that takes part in the ongoing dialogue of a constantly changing world.
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