ARTIST STATEMENT
This series of oil paintings are called “My Lisas,” and they are about coming-of age friendships, and FORMER best-friends. They are also about beauty, regret, guilt, love, loss and loneliness. The young women I depict exist in that beautiful, vulnerable and strange moment between youth and adulthood. I leverage the powerful memories evoked by this time in my life. The painted figures are inspired by photos I take at outdoor music festivals. I take crowd shots, then sketch one or two figures, removing the background and the crowd, leaving behind the figure and its shadow in a neutral empty space as though they are on a brightly lit stage. Within the paintings are short personal essays, or excerpts from essays, I have written about former “best” friends who are no longer in my life. I write honestly about these people who enhanced or complicated my life, challenged or completed me for a time. I express my emotions in an unashamed way, exploring how these special friendships truly felt and why they end. Perhaps some intense friendships are simply not meant to last. With the gentle collision of words and image, I strive to create something that connects us more deeply to ourselves and one another. I hopes these paintings evoke a sense of recognition in viewers, leading them to reflect on the impact of friends they’ve had that are no longer part of their lives. (Please note: If wall space is an issue, I have two smaller “Lisas”)
ABOUT THE ARTIST
Nancy Pochis Bank is a Chicago based painter. For more than two decades, she has run the Pochis Bank Art Studio, a full-service art studio creating custom art installations, murals and other artwork for unique locations, products and special events. Creating artwork under the name POCHIS, she is recipient of the multi-year Chicago Neighborhood Arts Program Grant. Pochis has provided fine art instruction to seniors and high school students. Her fine art has been exhibited in venues throughout the US, online and in publications. Pochis started her professional career in business, earning a BA from the University of Michigan and an MBA from the University of Chicago. In 2000, after twelve years in management consulting, she turned toward her lifelong passion for painting, enrolled in the Continuing Education Program at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and studied with Chicago artist Ed Hinkley. Pochis is an active arts advocate: she dedicates her time and art skills to benefit her community and raise awareness for a range of social issues through public artworks including five “Cool Globes” raising awareness of solutions to Climate Change. She serves on the Cool Globes board. Pochis was recently selected by the Chicago CTA and Lakeview-Roscoe Village Chamber of Commerce to create 3 works of public art as part of their Lowline Restoration Project. She was also selected by Selfless for Scott and Lincoln Park High School to design and spearhead a community mural project in the LPHS cafeteria.
© POCHIS