Jessica Brilli

Massachusetts · Acrylic and oil on canvas
Studio
Massachusetts
Medium
Acrylic and oil on canvas
Mixed Media

“We insert our own lives into these scenes from the past” – Jessica Brilli

Jessica Brilli (b. 1977) is a Massachusetts-based painter whose work excavates the vernacular of everyday life, the motel sign at midnight, the pool at noon, the car parked in winter light, finding in these images something at once familiar and irretrievably gone. She holds a BFA in Painting from the University of Rhode Island and a certificate in graphic design from Massachusetts College of Art and Design. After nearly two decades at Harvard University, she transitioned to painting full-time in 2021 and was awarded the Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant that same year.

Working primarily from photographic slides sourced from antique shops and yard sales, Brilli builds images that move between cinematic clarity and emotional ambiguity. Her figures, swimmers, skiers, watchers, are present but not revealed. Her architectural works hold their light without explanation. Her objects,the chair, the car, the typewriter, carry the weight of lives lived just outside the frame. The subject is never really the subject. What remains is a particular quality of afternoon that belongs to everyone and no one.

Studio Film

Artist Statement

My work begins with photographs, slides and prints gathered from antique shops and yard sales, images made by strangers in moments they thought worth keeping. I search through thousands to find the ones that move me. When one does, I don’t always know why immediately.

What I’ve come to understand is that certain images hold something beyond their subject. A pool in afternoon light. A car on a driveway. A figure caught mid-motion. These scenes produce involuntary memory, not just my own, but something shared. Viewers insert their own lives into them regardless of whether they were ever there.

Color is part of this. Vintage film ages in ways that function as a timestamp, a Gestalt that signals the past before the subject even registers. I paint into that quality deliberately, not to recreate nostalgia, but to understand why it moves us at all.

Blue Chair, 2026

16 x 16 inches (40.6 × 40.6 cm)

Acrylic and oil on canvas

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Winter Break, 2025

36 x 60 inches (91.4 × 152.4 cm)

Acrylic and oil on canvas

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Mobil Sign, 2026

40 x 40 inches (101.6 × 101.6 cm)

Acrylic and oil on canvas

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Cold Descent, 2026

48 × 30 in (121.9 × 76.2 cm)

Acrylic and oil on canvas

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Serpent Handler, 2025

40 x 40 inch (101.6 x 101.6 cm)

Acrylic and oil on panel

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Sage Green Chair, 2025

16 x 16 inches (40.6 × 40.6 cm)

Oil on canvas

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Neon Memory, 2025

40 x 30 inches (101.6 × 76.2 cm)

Oil and acrylic on canvas

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Betty’s Visit, 2021

30 x 40 inches (76.2 × 101.6 cm)

Acrylic and oil on canvas

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Pattys, 2021

36 x 48 inches (91.4 × 121.9 cm)

Acrylic and oil on canvas

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The Competition, 2022

72 x 48 inches (182.9 × 121.9 cm)

Oil on Canvas

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Dreaming, 2026

40 × 40 inches (101.6 x 101.6 cm)

Oil and acrylic on canvas

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Ascension, 2025

24 × 29 ¾ in (61 × 75.6 cm)

Acrylic and oil on canvas

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No Parking, 2022

48 x 72 inches (121.9 × 182.9 cm)

Oil on Canvas

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EXHIBITION HISTORY
SCROLL
2026
GROUP
The Shape of Things
Lion And Lamb, Philadelphia, USA
GROUP
Her
Maddox Gallery, London, England
SOLO
Static Motion
Boston, MA
GROUP
For The Soul
Seattle, WA
2025
GROUP
Maddox Collection
Maddox Gallery, London, England
2024
SOLO
Dream State
Maddox Gallery, London, England
GROUP
Summer Daze
Maddox Gallery, London, England
GROUP
Art Miami
Maddox Gallery, Miami, FL
2022
SOLO
Sarah Langley Gallery
Newport, RI
SOLO
Skidmore Contemporary Art
Santa Monica, CA
2021
SOLO
Development
Talon Gallery, Portland, OR
SOLO
On the Brink
Walker Cunningham Fine Art, St. Louis, MO
2019
SOLO
Carpool
Kobalt Gallery, Provincetown, MA
2018
GROUP
Fast Forward
Kelley Stelling Contemporary, Manchester, NH
SOLO
Summertime Blues
Kobalt Gallery, Provincetown, MA
2017
GROUP
Americana Revolution
House of Roulx, Danvers, MA
SOLO
Holiday
Kobalt Gallery, Provincetown, MA
SOLO
New Work
University of Rhode Island Project Space, Kingston, RI
2016
GROUP
What’s New With You, Kobalt Gallery, Provincetown, MA GROUP
Heren Magazine 10th Anniversary Exhibition, PKM Gallery, Seoul, Korea

Residencies & Public Projects

2024

ART X IV Residency

RailSpur, Seattle WA One-month residency producing work for Hotel Westland · May 2024

2025–2026

Large Works Installation

Meydenbauer Cultural & Convention Center Bellevue, WA · Oct 2025–Jan 2026

2024

Mural Installation, Equinox Georgetown

10-ft square mural · 6520 5th Ave S, Seattle WA · Mar 2024

2023

Public Mural Installation

RailSpur Building 10-ft square mural · 419 Occidental Ave S, Seattle WA · Jul–Dec 2023

Publications & Press

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