Stuart Snoddy
b.1981, Honduras; Lives and works in Indianapolis, IN
Stuart Snoddy's painting practice focuses on the complexity of self through a fantastical exploration of loneliness, family, otherness and imagination. Acting as both author and director, the artist integrates storytelling and fantasy into his paintings to illustrate a fabricated exotic culture. With ties to the historical tradition of American illustration, academic painting, and cinema, these "pleasant fictions" portray people and environments that, while inspired by real life, surface from the artist's yearning imagination and solidly occupy their own world. Working with oil on paper, panel and canvas in addition to gouache on paper, often in small formats, Snoddy employs vibrant recurring color palettes and further animates his work with quick, energetic brushwork. Rather than simply illustrating real-life pleasant memories, ones that deteriorate or sour when over-scrutinized, Snoddy's observational paintings are snapshots of thoughts and memories that emerge from consciousness, kept safe from over-analytical deterioration by remaining firmly rooted in fantasy. His work is representative of the unease of nostalgia and his search for emotional richness, conveyed through the characters' physical embodiment of longing, elation, sadness and love. By not shying away from the complete story of self, Snoddy's constructed fantasies nurture the narrative of human life as cohesive intellectual and emotional beings.
Stuart Snoddy has exhibited across the United States, including group exhibitions at the Indianapolis Art Center (2017), the McLean County Art Center in Bloomington, IL (2016) and the Harrison Center for the Arts in Indianapolis, IN (2016). Snoddy's work has been featured more recently in solo exhibitions at the Farmer Family Gallery at the Ohio State University at Lima (The Fantasy Figures, 2019) and at the Harrison Center for the Arts (Singsong, 2019). His work has been shown at galleries in cities across the country including Indianapolis, Denver, Philadelphia, Chicago and New York. The artist has been featured in print and online publications, such as New American Paintings and Hi-Fructose. Snoddy graduated with a BFA from the Herron School of Art and Design in Indianapolis and an MFA from Northern Illinois University (2015) and was selected to participate in the Atlantic Center for the Arts Artist-in-Residence program in New Smyrna Beach, FL in 2015. Snoddy is currently an instructor in Foundations and Painting at the Herron School of Art and Design in Indianapolis.
