Tools - Toni Hartley

On view: Ceremony Salon, Carrboro NC - July 28-August 28, 2022

TOOLS

A tool is anything deemed useful that increases learning and empowers the user. The ten paintings included in TOOLS explore where these items can take us on an inquisitive journey into healing ourselves and how they can inspire change within us.

Toni Hartley (b. 1980, Kansas, USA) is an artist based in Carrboro, North Carolina. This body of work represents the various tools she wielded for healing and soothing during the COVID-19 pandemic and each piece holds within it the potentiality of the tool depicted.

A clear nod to Hartley’s practice of using Tarot as a tool is also present. She will often guide newcomers to ask the cards what tools they need in a particular situation before a reading. These works imagine potential futures in which all bodies have access to that which they need to be healed, empowered and protected.

Inspired by a painting by Chicago Imagist Christina Ramberg simply titled, Hand, these hands defy gender but are a nod to the godmothers of contemporary, American, pop, figurative painting.

Please join us Thursday, July 28, 2022, from 6pm to 8pm at Ceremony in Carrboro, NC at 200 N. Greensboro Street, Suite a16 (next to Weaver Street Market) for the opening of TOOLS. The artist will be in attendance and there will be free drinks.

Bio

Toni Hartley (b. 1980, Kansas, USA) is a painter and musician based in Carrboro, North Carolina. She trained and studied various visual and musical arts throughout her youth and graduated with a BA in American Studies with a concentration in Arts in America from Smith College. Hartley’s art is often inspired by the investigative journey into healing oneself and creativity as a spiritual practice. Themes of queer identity, witch practices, environmentalism and anti-racism can be spotted throughout her expressive work.