| Jane South | |
| Nationality: | British and American |
| Occupation: | Artist and educator |
| Awards: | 2021 Guggenheim Fellowship 2009 Joan Mitchell Foundation Painters and Sculptors Grant 2006 NYFA (New York Foundation for the Arts) Fellowship |
| Education: | BFA Theatre Design, Central School of Art, London, UK MFA Painting and Sculpture, UNC Greensboro |
| Alma Mater: | University of North Carolina, Greensboro |
| Workplaces: | Pratt Institute, National Academy of Design |
Jane South is a British American artist and educator known for large scale installations, mixed media constructions, and fabric wall pieces.[1]
Born in Manchester, UK, South received a BFA in Theatre Design from Central School of Art in 1987 and an MFA in Painting and Sculpture from the University of North Carolina, Greensboro in 1997.[2]
South worked in experimental theater before moving to the United States in 1989. She began her academic career in 2001 with a two-year appointment at Williams College. South taught at Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) from 2013 to 2017 and was appointed Chair of Fine Arts at Pratt Institute in 2017.
She is Chair of the Siena Art Institute Advisory Board, and in 2019 was elected to the National Academy of Design.
South has described her work as being "influenced by the way I have seen my neighborhoods evolve (for better and worse) over the past few years. New York City in particular is de- and re-constructed so much that it exists in a constant state of undress, exposing its often dilapidated and or shoddily or cheaply constructed layers--to me it's a reminder of the illusory and temporary nature of our sense of place".[3] [4] For over a decade, she constructed cut-paper architectures, playing with two-and three-dimensions to create large scale installations described as "sculptural follies" that "seem to simultaneously celebrate and mourn the constructed wonders of the world".[5]
South's 2020 solo exhibition Switch Back was described by Jillian Steinhauer in The New York Times as "what you might call soft paintings" that "evoke homemade creations like patchwork quilts and curtains as much as the post-minimalism of Eva Hesse and Robert Morris, and even Claes Oldenburg’s replicas of ordinary objects".[6] In more recent work, "Her characteristic architectural forms and pseudo-industrial material are condensed. The past emphasis on three-dimensionality, accentuated by boxes and cages, are flattened into grids and swaths of subtle tones. Her signature paper and balsa wood constructs are replaced by tectonic assemblages of softer materials -canvas, tarp, packing foam, and thread."[7]
South is a contributor to the book The Artist as Cultural Producer: Living and Sustaining a Creative Life (editor: Sharon Louden).[8] She is the recipient of ai a 2021 Guggenheim Fellowship,[9] Brown/RISD Mellon Foundation Fellowship (2015);[10] Joan Mitchell Foundation Painters and Sculptors Grant (2009).[11] In 2019 She was elected to the National Academy of Design.