Julia Zollman Wickes—I Am a Storyteller

Julia Zollman Wickes-I Am a Storyteller is a retrospective celebrating the life and work of Julia Zollman Wickes, who passed away last year. In her art, Wickes highlighted people and places using dynamic colors, shapes, and a focus on storytelling. She imagined the inner lives of the people she painted, striving to capture the glances and gestures of individuals, as well as their inner thoughts. Each painting presents an ambiguous, richly layered snapshot of a moment, one that leads viewers to curiosity, wonder, and closer attention to the storied details all around us. 

People feature most prominently in Wickes' work: a diverse group of ordinary people with unique backgrounds, of which her paintings merely hint. Some subjects are captured absorbed in their work: a violinist and a trumpet player enjoying their music, chefs in a kitchen and dancers in a tight circle of synchronized movement. Many are depicted in typical activities, from a grandmother sitting down to breakfast to a man in a puffer jacket with luggage waiting for his plane. Yet each has an expression that is at once both unreadable and strangely familiar. 

Throughout, Wickes depicts people in a state of waiting and contemplation, sitting at an empty table and looking off into the distance, or gazing, lost in thought, at the viewer. Their gestures and expressions are delightfully enigmatic, prompting viewers to take a closer look and wonder about their stories. Who is the man waiting for a plane and to where, to whom, is he traveling? What would the grandmother–with her piercing blue eyes and mouth lined with decades of humor and legend–tell us if she could speak? 

The colors, details, shapes, and lines form a story in each and every one of Wickes' pieces. With her focus on capturing the inner life of subjects and seeking deeper meaning in each scene, her work truly shows that she was a master storyteller.