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Adrienne Simmons is a multi-disciplinary artist, using methods of printmaking, alternative photography, textiles, and digital design to explore themes of loss of place and memory, and their parallels with the landscapes of her past. Drawn to real and imagined landscapes, she uses abstract imagery in an attempt to understand how spaces and places hold memory. Recently learning of the Welsh word ‘hiraeth’ which translates as “distance pain,” she is curious about how places shape the people that live in them.
Her work has been collected by UTMB and MD Anderson, and she has shown at the Houston Center for Photography, the Print Museum, and the Blaffer Art Museum, while pursuing her MFA at the University of Houston (2024).
Here’s my CV.
Do you ever feel a distinct type of pain when reflecting on a place in your past? The Welsh have a word for this feeling called hiraeth, which translates to “distance pain.” It’s not quite a nostalgic yearning, but the true pain of loving a place. Having moved frequently around the US, I often experience this sense of place-pain.
My work responds to the landscapes I visit. I’m drawn to the way the land shapes our personal histories and memories. I collect the fragments of our lives—domestic textiles, crushed seashells, clumps of earth, and vines to make homemade charcoal. These found materials are collaged with satellite imagery, cyanotype, and acrylic mediums in an intuitive and alchemical practice. This multimedia exploration allows me to establish a sense of place, map ideas of collective memory, and attempt to embed the landscape into the surface of my work. Ultimately, the connection made with the land and the resulting work reconciles my hiraeth.