BIO
Erin Kendrick is a multidisciplinary artist, designer, and educator whose work centers on the lived experiences of Black women and girls. Through evocative, color-saturated portraiture and immersive installations, she explores themes of space, selfhood, and safety. Her stained, fluid acrylic paintings often depict figures in dialogue with one another, creating environments where they affirm, witness, and protect. Kendrick transforms galleries and museums into contemplative spaces where viewers are drawn into the visual narrative—challenging the separation between observer and subject and prompting deeper reflection on the roles we play in visual culture.
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A committed arts educator and cultural advocate, Kendrick holds a BFA from Florida State University and an MFA from Georgia State University. With 17 years of experience in education, consulting, and creative leadership, she serves as Director of Education at the Jacksonville Arts & Music School (JAMS) and as an Adjunct Professor at Flagler College. She is also the creator of Artist Types, a professional development series that equips artists with tools to sustain their creative practices. Kendrick has received numerous honors, including the 2019 Art Educator of the Year award from the Cultural Council of Greater Jacksonville. She has also received prestigious grants and fellowships, including the TILA Studios Garden Fellowship and the Community First Foundation Art Ventures grant, as well as residencies at Crisp-Ellert Museum of Art, Moving the Margins, and the Douglas Anderson School of the Arts.
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In both her teaching and artistic endeavors, Kendrick embodies the belief that "Art is not a thing. It is a way," using her practice to forge connections, foster empathy, and champion the voices of Black women and girls.
ARTIST STATEMENT
Through color-rich portraiture and immersive, site-responsive installations, my practice investigates the lived experiences of Black women and girls. Each body of work serves as both critical inquiry and visual narrative, exploring the intersections of spatial justice, identity formation, and the pursuit of psychological and physical safety.
In my exhibitions, spaces become sanctuaries where the cast of characters depicted in my stained, fluid acrylic paintings can exchange with, respond to, and safeguard one another. The integration of installation and painting welcomes the viewer into the visual narrative, inviting them to contemplate their role as both spectator and spectacle. By blurring the boundaries between artwork, viewer, and space, I aim to cultivate connection and provoke introspection. Drawing inspiration from artists Barkley Hendricks, Faith Ringgold, Simone Leigh, and Ebony G. Patterson, as well as cultural critic bell hooks, I invoke the transformative power of looking and seeing, engaging the viewer in the oppositional gaze.
Central to my artistic expression is the deliberate incorporation of visual narrative techniques borrowed from the realm of literary storytelling, employing elements such as character development, foreshadowing, and varying points of view. Within these works, specific motifs such as polka dots, hair beads, tables, eggs, and shotgun houses function as nuanced "easter eggs," intricately interwoven to guide viewers on a cohesive journey from inception to resolution. This fusion of storytelling techniques enriches comprehension, fostering empathy and forging profound connections.
My work champions the agency of black women and girls to occupy space unapologetically, allowing them to exist as they are - whole, human, and worthy of protection.
CV HIGHLIGHTS
EDUCATION
2003 MFA, Drawing & Painting, Georgia State University, Atlanta, GA
1999 BFA, Studio Art, Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL
SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2022 The Hotelmen, Crisp-Ellert Art Museum, Flagler College, St. Augustine, FL
Shelter in Place, The Corner Gallery, Moving the Margins Artist Residency, Jacksonville, FL
2021 The Things We Bring, Annette Howell Turner Center for the Arts, Valdosta, GA
Pikin, South Gallery at Florida State College at Jacksonville, Jacksonville, FL
2018 her own things - an exhibition by erin kendrick, Yellow House, Jacksonville, FL
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SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2023 Visions of Just Space - A Call for Courage, Care, and Community, Yellow House, Jacksonville, FL
Through Our Eyes - Then and Now, 30th Anniversary Exhibition, Ritz Theater & Museum, Jacksonville, FL
2022 Black Creativity 2022, Museum of Science & Industry, Chicago, IL
2021 Mirror in the Dark, Visionary Art Collective (digital exhibition), Juana Williams, Curator
Variance, I Like Your Work Podcast (digital exhibition), Jamaal Barber, Curator (catalog)
The Fact of Blackness, Dominique Gallery via Artsy.com (digital exhibition), Curator, Jasmine McNeal
30th Anniversary of Art Ventures Exhibition, Cummer Museum of Art & Gardens, Jacksonville, FL
2020 The Nameless Now, Crisp-Ellert Art Museum, St. Augustine, FL
Paint: Medium as Power, Barrett Art Center, Poughkeepsie, NY
As a Matter of Black, Miami Urban Contemporary Experience (MUCE), Miami, FL
2019 Through Our Eyes: Struggle and Resistance, Nelson Mandela Metropolitan Museum, Port Elizabeth, South Africa
Welcome to the Afrofuture: Ground Zero, New Orleans African American Museum, New Orleans, LA
Musing Women, FSCJ South Gallery, Wilson Center for the Arts, Jacksonville, FL
Enroute, Bethune Cookman College Performing Arts Center, Daytona, FL
Contemporary Portrait: A National Juried Exhibition, Louise Hopkins Underwood Center for the Arts, Lubbock, TX
2018 SUFFRAGE, Yellow House, Jacksonville, FL
Stories/Allegories, Jacksonville International Airport, Jacksonville, FL
Through Our Eyes 2018: Struggle & Resistance, Ritz Theater and Museum, Jacksonville, FL
2017 Kesha - A Black Female Experience of Identity and Race, Jax Makerspace, Jacksonville Public Library, Jacksonville, FL
2016 Through Our Eyes 2016: Sensory Perception, Ritz Theatre and Museum, Jacksonville, FL
2009 DCPS Faculty Exhibition, Wilson Center for the Arts, FSCJ Art Gallery, South Campus, Jacksonville, FL
She. An Artist Collective, Neighborhood Gallery & Art Center, Decatur, GA
2003 Be Somebody., MFA Thesis Exhibition, Georgia State University, Atlanta, GA
2002 Funk Jazz Kafe’ Summer Festival 2002, Scitrek Science Museum, Atlanta, GA
Short Short Short Video Night, Eyedrum Art & Music Gallery, Atlanta, GA
All Small, Eyedrum Art & Music Gallery, Atlanta, GA
Fresh!, NoNo, Atlanta, GA
Full Moon Project, Silent Auction/AIDS Survival Project, GSU School of Art & Design, Atlanta, GA
2001 “Loss/Recovery” Shrine 55/100, 100 Names Project, Apex Museum, Atlanta, GA
2000 Harvest, Art Farm, Atlanta, GA
1999 Idle Chatter, BFA Graduation Exhibition, FSU Museum of Fine Arts, Tallahassee, FL
Rollin Juried Show, Oglesby Gallery, Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL (Purchase Award)
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SELECTED PUBLIC ART
2024 Bus Shelters, NW Jacksonville Corridor Improvements, Jacksonville Transportation Authority, Jacksonville, FL
Graphic Designer, Historical Markers for the Lavilla Heritage Trail & Lift Every Voice & Sing Park, Jacksonville, FL
2021 Mobile Mural, Northeast FL Healthy Start Coalition, Jacksonville, FL
2020 Mural, Lead Artist, Mamas of the Movement, for Color Jax Blue, Myrtle Ave. & 18th Street, Jacksonville, FL
PUBLIC COLLECTIONS
Public Health Informatics Institute, Atlanta, GA
Community Hospice & Palliative Care Center – Baptist Medical Center South, Jacksonville, FL
Baptist MD Anderson Cancer Center, Jacksonville, FL
Oglesby Gallery, Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL
PUBLICATIONS AS AUTHOR
2022 Kendrick, Erin/JAMS Visual Art Students. ‘The Book of Lost Magic,’ New Reads Publications
2021 Kendrick, Erin. ‘Being Alive. Being a Woman. Being Colored: The dilemma of being black and female at the intersection of
visual and performance art during the Black Arts Movement’, With Fists Raised: Radical Art, Revolutionary Activism, and the Iconoclasm of the Black Arts Movement, Liverpool Press
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GRANTS/RESIDENCIES/FELLOWSHIPS
2023 TILA Studios 2023 Garden Fellowship, Atlanta, Georgia
2022 Artist Residency, House of Sedulo/Nomadic HoS, New Orleans, LA
Moving the Margins, Jacksonville Cultural Development Corporation, Jacksonville, FL
CEAM Artist Residency, Crisp-Ellert Art Museum, Flagler College, St. Augustine, FL
2019 Jackie Cornelius Artist-in-Residence, Douglas Anderson School of the Arts, Jacksonville, FL
2017 Artist-in-Residence, Lift Every Student Grant – Any Given Child/Cathedral Arts Project, Jacksonville, FL
2017 Community First Foundation Art Ventures Individual Artist Grant
AWARDS/RECOGNITION
2019 Art Educator of the Year, Cultural Council of Greater Jacksonville, Jacksonville, FL