Cheryl Humphreys’ undulating colors and elliptical topographies deliver a sensory experience. Invoking subtle, highly considered strategies, the artist seeks to generate physical calm in viewers of the work. As with The Bauhaus’ geometric colorists, Mark Rothko’s liminal spiritualism, or the 1970s architect of light, James Turrell, Humphreys identifies perception itself as material.

Printmaking is usually highly methodical and ritualistic, and it is absolutely so in Humphreys’ hands. Through repetition, the human body and mind drop into a more relaxed state; Humphreys builds this into her works like so much respite. Repetition also emphasizes the inextricable interrelatedness of color, texture, shape, and scale. As the artist’s compositions shift in hue or size, the forms and textures within them shift too, not unlike the ocean does, naturally, upon entering a cove. Like her aesthetic forbear, Josef Albers, Humphreys’ artwork is influenced by her design work. This interweaving of traditions generates a synesthesia-like experience in viewers, whose minds and bodies are uniquely and simultaneously engaged.

Written by Blair Taylor