2023 Senior Exhibition Artists 2023 Senior Exhibition Artists: Colleen Brady

About Colleen Brady

Hey stranger!  

My name is Colleen Brady, and I am an artist and designer based in Dennis, Massachusetts. On a typical day, you’ll find me digging my hands into soil at my gardening job, reminding myself to breathe in the hot yoga studio, and hanging with the animals on my aunt’s farm.

Before enrolling at UMass Dartmouth in 2018, I had studied at three different schools. I changed my major… I don’t how many times. I joined Air Force ROTC in a landlocked town sixteen hours from home, with dreams of becoming a combat medic. I sardined myself onto the four o’clock green line and took a business class in Copley Square. I sat and listened to my music major friends jam in UMass Boston’s practice rooms, then slept on the empty floor of the library until I had my next biology lab. Throughout this period of confusion and excitement, I took up painting. I became intoxicated by the power of creativity, and how one idea or feeling could be expressed in an infinite number of ways. When I found myself stumbling for words, my art spoke for me.

My creations are diaristic in manner, with references to human anatomy and science, graffiti and street art, the complexities of being a small fish in a big sea, and the rawness of being an imperfect human being.

Statement

Will You Trust Me? unfolded during a period of deep reflection and ongoing therapy. While revisiting past traumas and tracing them to current behaviors, I was forced to sit with uncomfortable feelings, often looking for ways to escape my isolation. 

Diaristic at its core, this painting is meant to be looked at from a distance, and close-up. From far away, it embodies a visual abstraction of color and texture—multiple pieces of a puzzle that fit together in the exact way I intended them to. As you draw nearer, the individual details shed an understanding on the intricacies of my thoughts and emotions during this time: themes of temptation and escapism, fragility and duality, forgiveness and sacrifice, fear and resistance. And most importantly: God’s unyielding love.

Will you trust me?  

I trust you, Lord. 

Contact 

Colleenbrady5@gmail.com 

Will You Trust Me? Is more than a painting— it has been my visual diary for the past six months. This past November, I stepped up to the 4’ x 4’ canvas, terrified by its size and completely unaware of what it would become. Like most of my paintings, I started abstractly and with urgency— throwing, smearing, and spraying paint. An image of a screaming bird started to unfold, and instead of forcing something else, I veered into what the painting was telling me it wanted to be.

Will You Trust Me? unfolded during a period of deep reflection and ongoing therapy. While revisiting past traumas and tracing them to current behaviors, I was forced to sit with uncomfortable feelings, often looking for ways to escape my isolation. I returned to my faith in God, and His love proved to be such a guiding force during this difficult time. I couldn’t help but notice, though, that the more I trusted Him, the harder the Devil worked to throw me off course.

Diaristic at its core, this creation is teeming with information about myself, and while the vulnerability is palpable, there are limitations on what I choose to disclose to you. Instead, I will share with you some various themes that this painting embodies: childhood-rooted fear, scrutiny and double-standards, girlhood and femininity in a male-centric world, temptation and escapism, fragility and duality, forgiveness and sacrifice, resistance, and pride. But most importantly—it is about God’s unyielding love.

From far away, the painting embodies a visual abstraction of color and texture—multiple pieces of a puzzle that fit together in the exact way I intended them to. As you draw nearer, the individual details shed an understanding on the intricacies of my thoughts and emotions during this time. While you are looking at it, enjoy the sound compositions I have created to correspond with this painting. Feel free to walk around with the CD player, or simply listen while you study my painting. And of course— do not hesitate to poke my brain if you have a question.

Will you trust me?  

I trust you, God. 

Colleen Brady xoxo