"A lot of the works speak to a sense of isolation, how that isolation relates to the landscape, and how I find myself in that landscape — physically, metaphorically, spiritually."
— Vanessa Marsh, 2015
The photographs in visual artist Vanessa Marsh’s series Everywhere All At Once are mysterious and dream-like, made through a personally developed process involving drawing, painting, and darkroom techniques. Marsh delineates pictorial space by layering multiple two-dimensional planes to create a minimalistic, graphic aesthetic. The work provides a space for the viewer to contemplate their place in the universe and to consider how what is real and what is truth is understood in contemporary experiences.
For Marsh, Everywhere All At Once—imagined landscapes with intensely starlit skies—highlights a personal and a collective experience of the world. She creates a relatable false reality, one that emphasizes the moments in our lives when we feel the most connected to the cosmos, while underscoring the disconnect of our daily lives.
Vanessa Marsh was born in Seattle, Washington and earned a BA from Western Washington University in 2001, followed by an MFA in 2004 from California College of the Arts. Marsh has exhibited recently at the Contemporary Jewish Museum, San Francisco; Richard L. Nelson Gallery, University of California, Davis; Foley Gallery, New York; The Camera Club of New York; Photo-Eye Gallery, Santa Fe, New Mexico; and Julie Nester Gallery, Park City, Utah. She was awarded fellowships at the Headlands Center for the Arts (2004), The MacDowell Colony (2007), and Kala Art Institute (2011). In 2014, she was an Artist in Residence at Rayko Photo Center in San Francisco. Images from this series are on permanent exhibition in Terminal 3. Marsh lives and works in Oakland, California.