the human experience project

“The Human Experience Project”

The Fine Arts Center for the New River Valley is proud to present The Human Experience Project, featuring works by artist and philosopher Katy Shepard, Ph.D.

• On view at the Fine Arts Center in Pulaski from Friday, October 18 - Saturday, November 23, 2024

• The opening reception is Thursday, October 24, from 5:00 to 8:00 p.m. at the Center.

About the Exhibition:

Artist and philosopher Katy Shepard, Ph.D (She/They), explores the boundaries of empathy through intuitive abstraction in her series, The Human Experience Project, consisting of large-scale oil mixed-media works. While the paintings in Shepard’s series appear abstract, she describes these works as “hyper-realistic” visual translations of audio data. 

The core of The Human Experience Project is a series of recordings from individuals sharing a significant moment in their lives. Shepard painted each work while listening to the continuous looped recordings, letting the sound and audio quality intuitively guide the brushstrokes. Shepard’s process of intuitively translating audio narratives into visual work offers a compelling investigation into empathy shaped by personal perspective.

artist bio:

Katy Shepard, PhD (She/They) has resided in the New River Valley on and off for the past 14 years studying and working at the intersection of existentialist ethics and the arts. She is a professor of Philosophy teaching primarily in the fields of ethics and social justice, with a specialization in liberation through the arts. The content of her studio practices align with her research on participation in the creative process as a radical act of humanity, activism, and liberation.

Additionally, Shepard is the owner and operator of “Scallywag Letterpress,” an artisan business offering unique prints, paintings, and handmade paper for purchase. You can often find Shepard vending at local art markets around the New River Valley and the surrounding areas.

artist statement:

“We try, when we hear another’s story, to understand fully the

emotions described—we try to take on those emotions as our own in

order to share in those experiences. But the completion of this task

is impossible and empathy in itself is a kind of forgery.

Through The Human Experience Project I collected the stories of

individuals and tried desperately to take on the persona of their

feelings. Listening to the audio recordings of the stories on loop

every time I touched a paintbrush to the canvas, I created what I

wanted to describe as a perfect, realistic, and direct translation of

those emotions. Each mark was to be empowered by the emotional content

of the narrative alone.

But I failed.

I failed because the experiences in translation were not those of the

individuals’ whose stories I listened to, but my own experience of

listening in on these private affairs. Everything I have and ever will

create is through the lens of my own experiences. As hard as we may

try, we will never fully understand the Other. This entity is, and

will forever be, defined by our own Self. However, we should never

give up on this task because it is only in attempting to understand

the Other that we may come to truly understand our Self.

This is the Human Experience.”