In her collages, drawings, paintings, and films, Ellen Gallagher invites viewers on a journey of social inquiry. Gallagher describes her artistic process as driven by a “jitter” which aims to shake loose aesthetic possibilities from seemingly impermeable cultural structures. Focusing on details such as visual motifs associated with minstrel performance and the water of the Middle Passage, Gallagher’s oeuvre offers a subversive exploration of Black history. Her multilayered paintings often combine the rigidly imposed order of a grid or penmanship paper with organic forms of collage and bright plasticine.

–Elizabeth Shaw, from the Glenstone Field Guide