{"id":35699,"date":"2018-04-03T15:04:42","date_gmt":"2018-04-03T21:04:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/?p=35699"},"modified":"2025-11-04T17:21:15","modified_gmt":"2025-11-05T00:21:15","slug":"emily-fox-king-artist-blooming","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/emily-fox-king-artist-blooming\/","title":{"rendered":"Emily Fox King: Artist Blooming"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/emily_fox_king-1200x800.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-large wp-image-36112\" src=\"http:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/emily_fox_king-1200x800-1200x800.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1200\" height=\"800\" srcset=\"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/emily_fox_king-1200x800.jpg 1200w, https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/emily_fox_king-1200x800-350x233.jpg 350w, https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/emily_fox_king-1200x800-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/emily_fox_king-1200x800-300x200.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1200px) 100vw, 1200px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<h4>It\u2019s always easier to tell a story when it\u2019s over, when you\u2019ve arrived at a place recognizable as a destination, to have things tidily wrapped up despite whatever struggle or confusion might have preceded it, to know what it was all about, what it means. This isn\u2019t one of those stories. Emily Fox King is at what Dante called the middle of life\u2019s walk, so nothing\u2019s wrapped up, no conclusions have been made. She\u2019s at a point that is as much about looking forward as looking back.<\/h4>\n<div id=\"attachment_51994\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"http:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/MothersDay.jpeg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-51994 size-medium\" src=\"hhttp:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/MothersDay-350x463.jpeg\"  alt=\"\" width=\"350\" height=\"463\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-caption-text\">\u201cMother\u2019s Day,\u201d 2018, oil on canvas, 48\u2033 x 60\u2033<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<h4>King lives in a mid-century rambler not far from the campus of Weber State University. In the yard, a tricycle, a broken light saber and a plastic box full of rice and small toys (a safe alternative to a sandbox) attest to the presence of her young children. Two are rumbling around inside. A third is at school. A finger painting, done by the youngest, hangs above the couch, where it was hastily pinned up to replace one of King\u2019s own paintings, now hanging at the Alice Gallery in Salt Lake City.<\/h4>\n<h4><em>Florescentia<\/em>, King\u2019s exhibit of new works, fills the intimate space on South Temple with a riot of color \u2014 paint swirled, scraped and jabbed across canvas to form a score of overflowing floral motifs. Many are 4 feet or more in either dimension, so the flowers are larger than life, threatening to overpower the viewer with visual stimuli. Yet, dramatic as their execution might be, these are floral paintings. One might be tempted to add \u201cjust.\u201d Not exactly cutting edge. Nor the type of work you might expect from King if you came across her at BYU.<\/h4>\n<h4>As she pursued her MFA in the late aughts, King was doing a lot of work in new media like video, performance and installation. Her pieces explored traditional notions of femininity, like her ironic video works that featured beauty pageants, ballet, sewing, synchronized swimming and pastries, or her final MFA show in 2010,\u00a0<em>Fabricating Womanhood,<\/em>\u00a0an installation of a human-size dollhouse. The work was well received by her peers and she continued to feel affirmation for what she had done when, after graduation, she would return to campus and people would remember her work and compliment her on it.<\/h4>\n<p><center><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/IDFJO9A_Noc\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\" data-mce-fragment=\"1\"><\/iframe><\/center><\/p>\n<h4>Once out of school, King moved to Salt Lake City, where she taught at Indian Hills Elementary, on Salt Lake City\u2019s East Bench, before driving UMOCA\u2019s art truck for two years. Artistically, she says she was \u201cdinking around.\u201d She returned to her first love, painting, with an exhibition at Sweet Branch Library called\u00a0<em>Princess Religion<\/em>. Her description of one work \u2014 \u201ca buxom Disney princess with her Mormon Disney-castle wedding\u201d \u2014 gives a sense of the satirical approach she was taking as she examined the life around her in her late 20s: people from her community obsessed with money, makeup and plastic surgery. Though the works employed a more traditional medium, they continued the trajectory of her MFA work, exploring issues of female identity.<\/h4>\n<h4><a href=\"http:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/thumbnail-1.jpeg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-51999\" src=\"http:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/thumbnail-1-350x467.jpeg\"  alt=\"\" width=\"350\" height=\"467\" \/><\/a>King grew up in the Tri-Cities area of Washington state, LDS, the middle of seven children. She had what she describes as \u201cdisordered eating\u201d \u2014 not full-blown bulimia or anorexia, but body- image issues. Though she loved dance, for instance, at 12 she realized she would never have the body of a ballerina and gave it up.<\/h4>\n<h4>Things didn\u2019t get much better in college (though she did take a modern dance class, as \u201ca way to heal\u201d). \u201cBeing 18, 19, 20 \u2014 that\u2019s just one of the worst times in a woman\u2019s life,\u201d she says, speaking from her own experience but reinforced by observations she\u2019s made teaching at Weber State for the past six years. \u201cYou\u2019re just incredibly vulnerable, you don\u2019t know if you have a voice. You have tunnel vision, where everything\u2019s about you and what you look like and how you\u2019re perceived and how cool you are.\u201d<\/h4>\n<h4>Her parents both worked with their hands \u2014 her mother is an artist, her father a surgeon \u2014 but, too busy playing bass in jazz band, King had skipped art in high school. When she went to Western Washington University, however, she knew that\u2019s what she wanted to study. She concentrated on painting for most of her four years until she discovered printmaking her last semester, which spurred her to pursue graduate work at BYU. That\u2019s where she took up installation and video work.<\/h4>\n<h4>The flowers didn\u2019t appear until Vernal. She went there with her husband, whom she met during her time in Salt Lake City. She was 29 by then, he already had a son \u2014 not your stereotypical LDS trajectory, she notes. He was a geologist and Vernal was experiencing one of its periodic oil booms. They lived in a one-bedroom apartment and she painted in the kitchen, at night. \u201cThat really taught me I can paint anywhere,\u201d she says of working far from any art store, under terrible light, producing fairly large work despite the cramped circumstances. She still frequently paints at night, or whenever she can snatch some time, staying up till 2 or 3 in the morning, or working on Christmas Day and other holidays, anytime her husband has off work and can help with the kids. \u201cI think if it wasn\u2019t so hard to paint, maybe I wouldn\u2019t do it.\u201d If for nothing else, she\u2019s proud of the work at the Alice Gallery for the simple fact that she was able to pull it off. \u201cIt represents a lot of sacrifice of my time.\u201d<\/h4>\n<div id=\"attachment_52000\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/Parmelie.jpeg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-52000 size-full\" src=\"http:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/Parmelie.jpeg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1000\" height=\"750\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-caption-text\">\u201cParmelie Comptois,\u201d 2018, Oil on Canvas, 48 x 60 in.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<h4>It won\u2019t be a surprise to learn that floral paintings sell a whole lot better than her satirical works. In fact, some of the objects of her previous scorn might now be buying her paintings on Etsy for their living rooms. \u201cI\u2019m like, do they know what I\u2019m trying to say?\u201d she comments. But she\u2019s also come to a place where whether they do or don\u2019t doesn\u2019t matter as much. \u201cI\u2019m getting older and I\u2019m like, who cares. I enjoy making it; it\u2019s great to have people liking it. I know there\u2019s more to it, it\u2019s more intellectual, there are things I\u2019m trying to put into the work, but if the viewer comes to it with something else, and they\u2019re not getting what I\u2019m putting into it, my ideas on femininity, that\u2019s fine.\u201d<\/h4>\n<h4>In fact, King does not seem particularly eager to spell out what she is doing with these paintings. \u201cCan\u2019t you just look at the painting?\u201d she asks of the rhetorical critic who would like her to explain her work. \u201cThat\u2019s why I\u2019m a painter, so I don\u2019t have to \u2018say\u2019 it\u2026\u201d she comments, recalling her university days, when the need to talk about or write about one\u2019s work was paramount. \u201cMaybe I\u2019m still immature,\u201d she muses with characteristic honesty. \u201cIf I had to say it, I might not want to stand by it.\u201d<\/h4>\n<h4>She describes flowers, especially arranged flowers, as symbolic of a type of mask, and painting them functions as another sort of mask, allowing her to create work that interests her but is also attractive to a larger audience. Mostly, she\u2019s just eager to paint, and flowers are an excuse to put paint \u2014 a lot of paint \u2014 on canvas. \u201cI just want to make work. I love writing about art, I love thinking about art, all kinds of art, but sometimes it trips me up in my own process, to think too hard about it.\u201d<\/h4>\n<div id=\"gallery-1\" class=\"gallery galleryid-51415 gallery-columns-3 gallery-size-thumbnail\">\n<dl class=\"gallery-item\">\n<dt class=\"gallery-icon landscape\"><a href=\"http:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/index.php\/emily-fox-king-artist-blooming\/goodtimesbadtimesgivemesomeofthat\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" src=\"http:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/GoodTimesBadTimesGiveMeSomeOfThat-290x290.jpeg\"  alt=\"\" width=\"290\" height=\"290\" \/><\/a><\/dt>\n<\/dl>\n<dl class=\"gallery-item\">\n<dt class=\"gallery-icon landscape\"><a href=\"http:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/index.php\/emily-fox-king-artist-blooming\/img_4424\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" src=\"http:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/IMG_4424-290x290.jpg\"  alt=\"\" width=\"290\" height=\"290\" \/><\/a><\/dt>\n<\/dl>\n<dl class=\"gallery-item\">\n<dt class=\"gallery-icon portrait\"><a href=\"http:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/index.php\/emily-fox-king-artist-blooming\/mtryingtosay\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" src=\"http:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/WhatImTryingToSay-290x290.jpeg\"  alt=\"\" width=\"290\" height=\"290\" \/><\/a><\/dt>\n<\/dl>\n<\/div>\n<h4>King worked in a florist shop one summer after moving to Ogden, so she\u2019s been around plenty of flowers. But, botanists beware, she\u2019s no literalist. These are approximations of flowers, \u201cinspired by,\u201d \u201cbased on.\u201d She works from found photographs mostly, using them to get herself started, but then the paint takes on a life of its own. Some species may be recognizable, but King has assumed the role of Mother Nature, developing new genera if she needs an excuse to streak some ultramarine blue across the canvas, or work up a swirl of magenta.<\/h4>\n<h4>Focus in on any individual portion of her canvases and you could easily see King pushing the works to full abstraction, a direction she says she may become \u201cbrave enough\u201d to embrace. She\u2019s open to all kinds of possibilities for the future. \u201cI still love printmaking, I love making things out of clay, I\u2019d love to experiment in those areas as well.\u201d<\/h4>\n<h4>One of the works at the Alice seems more muted than the rest, washes of black and gray infused in the painting, as if decay has begun to set in. Her husband came up with the title: \u201cBitumen.\u201d \u201cIt\u2019s kind of messy,\u201d she says. \u201cI like the idea of pretty flowers, but underneath it, I want to put some grit in it.\u201d This tendency to go dark has characterized her career. \u201cMy mom is like, \u2018Why can\u2019t you just make something nice.\u2019\u201d Even during her undergrad she was \u201calways doing people with scary teeth, a lady holding a dead chicken, fat ballerinas.\u201d Those days seem to be part of the past, however. While some grit may remain, one suspects the anger is gone.<\/h4>\n<div id=\"attachment_51416\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/studio.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-51416 size-full\" src=\"http:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/studio.jpg\"  alt=\"\" width=\"1800\" height=\"1200\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Photo by Shawn Rossiter<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<h4>That may be because, even if things aren\u2019t neatly packaged up and resolved, Emily Fox King is settling in to a place she is comfortable with. The family bought their rambler in August, their first house. Like life, it\u2019s a work in progress, evidence of remodeling apparent as one walks downstairs, where King\u2019s studio is an alcove near a sliding door, the children running past a work in progress on her easel to play outside. It\u2019s not that life is perfect, but King seems happy with her family \u2014 she\u2019s a kind, attentive mother \u2014 and herself: \u201cI\u2019m the most out of shape I\u2019ve been in my life,\u201d she says, \u201cbut I like my body.\u201d<\/h4>\n<h4>And she\u2019s happy with her art. \u201cI have found support with the painting, with making object-based work.\u201d In addition to the Alice show, she will be showing April 20-21 at the Utah Art Market at the Sugarhouse Garden Center, where you can expect to find more of her vibrant, riotous florals, and where you might want to keep in mind that artists like van Gogh and Matisse changed the art world with floral paintings. \u201cI know you\u2019re not supposed to admit it, but I love van Gogh,\u201d she jokes. It\u2019s a clich\u00e9, not the type of thing she would mention at the university, or if she did she would be sheepish about it. Or maybe not. \u201cI need to keep blooming here, and be OK with who I am.\u201d<\/h4>\n<div id=\"attachment_51417\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/emilyandkids.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-51417 size-full\" src=\"http:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/emilyandkids.jpg\"  alt=\"\" width=\"1800\" height=\"1184\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Photo by Shawn Rossiter<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><em>Florescentia<\/em>, works by Emily Fox King,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/heritage.utah.gov\/arts-and-museums\/things-galleries-alice\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Alice Gallery<\/a>, Salt Lake City, through May 4.<\/p>\n<div class=\"saboxplugin-wrap\"><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It\u2019s always easier to tell a story when it\u2019s over, when you\u2019ve arrived at a place recognizable as a destination, to have things tidily wrapped up despite whatever struggle or confusion might have preceded it, to know what it was all about, what it means. This isn\u2019t one [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":36112,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_piecal_is_event":false,"_piecal_start_date":"","_piecal_end_date":"","_piecal_is_allday":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,14],"tags":[3093],"class_list":["post-35699","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-artist_profiles","category-visual_arts","tag-emily-fox-king"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/emily_fox_king-1200x800.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-29 10:28:37","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35699","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35699"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35699\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":97700,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35699\/revisions\/97700"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/36112"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35699"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35699"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35699"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}