Bordering on abstract expressionism, Jo. Messer weaves narratives that are playful, erotic, and consumptive in turn, utilizing saturated canvases that house female nudes in various states of deconstruction and abstraction. Messer masterfully implies and obscures the bodies of these women – toes and shins hint at hips and torsos and then diverge into plates of fruit or seafood. Messer’s meditation on the themes of sex and food complicates the figures on her canvases, blurring the line between consumer and object of consumption. Her unique style explores painting’s full potential while playing with the historical and conceptual underpinnings of the medium. Jo Messer received her BFA from the Cooper Union in 2014 and her MFA from Yale University in 2017. Her work has been the subject of solo exhibitions at 56 HENRY, New York; the Rubell Museum, Miami, FL; Morán Morán, Mexico City, CDMX and The Ranch, Montauk.