It's My House!

Virginia Broersma is a Los Angeles-based artist whose work focuses on figurative painting and the representation of bodies at leisure. Her engagement with the art community involves curating, writing, collaborative projects, public art, and organizing support for artists along with her studio practice. 

Broersma’s work has been exhibited at museums, galleries and alternative spaces in Los Angeles, Berlin, Tokyo, New York, and Chicago among other US and international cities. Recent projects have been shown at the Wignall Museum of Contemporary Art and the Museum of Latin American Art. Broersma has received several grants from cities as well as private foundations including the City of Chicago and the Mozaik Foundation. Additionally, Broersma takes on select curatorial and writing projects that relate to her interests in the studio and in 2016 was jointly selected for the Emerging Curators Program at Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions (LACE). Recent press has included articles and reviews in CARLA, Art and Cake and Artillery Magazine and her published writing projects have included features on video artist Rabyn Blake, DIY Projects in Los Angeles, and various exhibition catalogue essays and interviews with artists.

Broersma lives in Long Beach, CA and her studio is located in downtown Los Angeles, CA. 

“I make paintings of people at leisure. While leisure is often associated with idleness, I find richness in learning about the ways people rest. My figures are often lounging around pools and are layered with the complexities surrounding concepts of exposure, the relationship to place, the laws and social contracts that determine how our bodies exist in our world, and the uneven access to choice. This work overlaps the social and the private, the intimate and the anonymous all at once. For me, a pool is a fantasy, but also a reality of living in California.

I look to local histories such as the boosterism and mythmaking of Los Angeles seen in the lifestyles and attitudes here in La La Land. I also consider larger, more universal discussions like who gets to rest uninhibited. Pools are representative of the culture, but also highlight who is left behind.  

I started sculpting frames for some of my paintings to act as a bridge between the flat fantasy and the dimensional world, suggesting a closer connection to lived experience. At the same time, they act as an ornamental reminder that a painting is also a fantasy”. 

@virginiabroersma

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