An Offering For Life

Hollis Sigler was a founding member of the Chicago-based female cooperative Artemesia Gallery. She made often heartbreakingly honest, generously open paintings that uses autobiography as inspiration. Sigler's work, even in its most empathetic evocation of despair manages to exude joy in the unexpected. Strong female figures, often silhouetted or emphatically present in interiors though their bodies are absent, provide a human connection throughout her work and propel it toward spiritual celebration. Even in Sigler's darkest hour, when she was struggling with breast cancer, her work emerged assertive and full of love and hope. Often that positively manifests itself through clothing that acts as a flying body; interior furnishings and decorations that sing with life; and hairbrushes, jewelry, and makeup that seem more like sacred relics than evidence of the everyday.