Leann M. Dzemske b.1985

  • Leann has a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, and a Master of Science in Art Therapy and Counseling from Eastern Virginia Medical School.  She is returning back to her artistic practice after a hiatus establishing her art therapy career in Jackson, WY. In the past, her works have been exhibited and added to private collections in MN, VA, CA, WI, and now in WY. 
  • As a child Leann would disappear for hours outside building forts, digging in the mud, watching animals, amphibians, and insects falling asleep under the sun listening to the birds and wind rustling tall grasses in the farm fields of Wisconsin. As a young adult, she found a connection to peace, a desire to serve others, and something greater than our human existence through the loving embrace of diverse cultures, countries, and ecosystems using large-scale, repetitive shape-making art in contemplation of the deeper knowings her adventures created. Memories, nature, spirituality, self-healing, and a desire for connection drive Leann's work. 
  • In her current series, Leann explores her memories, self, and therapeutic reflections coupled with her deep admiration, and gratitude for the landscape and animals she's encountered since moving to Jackson, WY. In the Pick-A-Teton the viewer is invited to take in a visual mantra intended to bring an optical meditative space for the mind to soothe agitation. If one moves through the series numerically they will notice a difference as they approach the final image. It didn't become apparent to Leann until she began the numeric timeline but the images correlate to her losing her beloved dog (1) and coming to a deep peace with the pain of that loss (10). The Centering and Duality pieces are reflections of Leann's adult and childhood memories tied to each central figure. The reflecting animals, the spiral of the shell, and the gold accents are challenges for the viewer's introspection on self and how they can find peace in the tensions that dualities (Merriam-Webster definition of Duality- the quality or state of having two different or opposite parts or elements)  bring in our lives and be more present in life the way nature and adventure instinctively force out of us. 

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