The native Moblian’s earliest experiences on a farm inspired a lifelong interest in nature’s forms and textures, and continue to influence themes in her art. Incorporating materials and found objects that allude to the personal narratives that shape our lives, Bedsole marries material virtuosity with an uncommon sensitivity to myth and the power of natural form.
Raine Bedsole: YOU ARE THE RIVER is on view at the Mobile Museum of Art November 13, 2015 – October 30, 2016. It has been made possible by grants from the C.D., Helen and Jeff Glaze Foundation, Jaguar of the Gulf Coast, the city of Mobile, the Alabama State Council on the Arts, and the National Endowment for the Arts.
“Raine Bedsole’s You Are the River is the first in a new series of site-specific installations by contemporary artists,” MMofA Director Deborah Velders notes. “Bedsole’s work is sheer visual poetry, offering the viewer a deeply moving, uplifting experience of beauty and light.”
Evocative, haunting and serene, Bedsole’s art whispers in the timeless language of mythology and symbolism. Nautical imagery that informs the artist’s work harkens to the Egyptian barques that ferried souls into the afterlife, Norse longboats embodied with poignancy and romance, Native American canoes, and the raft that rescues us from harm and delivers us to safety. They elicit the phenomenon of memory and the dynamic between the objects and experiences; those that anchor us to our past and those that liberate us to let go.
Recent recognition includes feature footage of her work in the final two Twilight movies, and grants for public art from the Joan Mitchell Foundation and the Jefferson Parish Public Art Initiative. Bedsole’s work is included in the collections of the New Orleans Museum of Art and the South Carolina Museum of Art, as well as many other public and private collections both nationally and internationally.
She received a Bachelor of fine art from Auburn University and a Masters of fine art from the San Francisco Art Institute. Returning to the South, Bedsole settled in New Orleans 20 years ago.