01/31 - 02/22 @ Context Collective, Troy

*Photos by Debi Gustafson, Art by Emily Lamb*

“Lamb’s work evokes the idea that our bodies contain multitudes.”

Candy-coated wastelands, tendrils of nipple hair, porcelain figurines, and bodily fluids. Emily Lamb’s paintings confront the clownish silliness and deep mystery of our human form.

Her work is on view at Troy’s new art gallery, Context Collective, run by owner and curator Mariah Kitner and co-founder and artist-in-residence, Ash King, until Saturday, February 22nd. Lamb’s work is a surreal dance between impish sexuality and the grotesque. Her palette of pinks and reds reflect the exposed membranes and tissues of the bodies she paints. This combination grounds the viewer in their own body while simultaneously sending them off to a far-flung dreamland.

Equally striking is the mix of realism and uncanniness that can be found in each painting's subjects. Lamb’s skill for rendering some objects as inert figurines and fleshing out what is human–skin, hair, fluid, etc.–is particularly awe-inspiring.

Viewers are instantly drawn in by images of starkly naked bodies and blush toned nowhere-land planes of existence, but the more time you spend with these works, the more you’ll be rewarded. Small and intricate details like the dolls and cat statuettes in Still-Life-In-Death (2021) or the texture of inner and outer organs and veins in A Place Meant to Hide (2023) begin to intensify and captivate. Viewers are left to fill in their own details about what these images might mean in the context of their own body and the hidden recesses of the imagination.

Several of Lamb’s paintings are framed in delicate doilies and ruffles, an arresting contrast between the blood reds and visceral imagery. Perceived femininity is intertwined with (maybe even inextricably linked to) bodily truths and discomforts. The serene expressions seen on many of the subjects against the strange and otherworldly imagery creates an unsettling yet impossible-to-look-away-from scene.

In addition to the larger paintings on display, several zines by the artist are included in the show that also traffic in topics on mortality and the physical. Among these is a zine entitled Slither, which tells the story of a centipede that crawls inside the body of an unsuspecting woman. She is later harassed on the street by a man and, after rebuffing his catcalls, cuts eyes at him, turns her body, and… I won’t spoil the ending. There’s much beauty and ugliness at play in this short story: the repulsiveness of a bug finding its home within a living body, the cheap “flattery” of someone who instantly reveals himself to be hostile and threatening, and the way something perceived as creepy, gross, or uncomfortable can live alongside us.

Lamb’s work evokes the idea that our bodies contain multitudes. Our outsides are quickly perceived as desirable one minute, disgusting the next, and ultimately mysterious and somewhat unknowable to others and even ourselves. The last line of Lamb’s artist statement reads as follows: “Our relationship between our bodies and our various selves is sometimes so profound that our own existence can sometimes make our skin crawl.” Her art is a reminder that what we often seek to hide or tame about ourselves is, at times, an inescapable performance outside of our control.

Corporeal Daydreams is on view from January 31st through February 22nd, 2025 at Context Collective, located at 95 4th Street, Troy. For more information on Context Collective, visit www.contextclay.com