Monya Rowe is excited to announce the first solo exhibition of paintings by Amy Longenecker-Brown titled Miracle House Ruminations.

Longenecker-Brown presents us with a catalog and calendar of desires, a pictorial sequence of ‘what if’ scenarios. The series, Birthday Wish List, depicts objects of desire: an 18th Century country estate; a cow, horse and chicken for self-sufficient farming; a pug for a comfort creature; the classic male in the form of George Clooney; an extravagant dinner with martinis and cake. Longenecker-Brown glorifies her personal obsessions and desires by framing them against a false landscape backdrop creating a spatial dislocation that sets the scene for an imagined narrative. Raised in a Mennonite (Anabaptist) community in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, Longenecker-Brown’s confession for decadence in turn forces the artist to inwardly examine what it means to embrace personal desires in an environment where want and need are linked to a religious ideology. With religious roots taking a backseat, the artist explores the biological human characteristic of longing and the existential effect of the act of indulgence, or want, and how this leads to self-examination and even self-doubt; are these decadent thoughts a sin?

In another group of paintings, titled The Companion Series, the artist ruminates over potential companions as a means of philosophical or spiritual enlightenment: Monday with Jesus, Tuesday with Clooney, Wednesday with Kierkegaard, Thursday with Praying man, Friday with Pets, Saturday With Guston, and Sunday, deliberately void of a companion, is open for interpretation. Conceptually exploring spiritual disillusionment with theoretical thought, the paintings of Longenecker-Brown provide a platform to search for complacency, community, a sanctuary and even a companion for the dispirited individual.

Amy Longenecker-Brown received a MFA from Mason Gross School of the Arts, Rutgers University, New Jersey; a BFA from Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, Rhode Island including a summer study abroad in Rome, Italy. She lives and works in Brooklyn, New York.