Janis Brothers Visual Artist

Comments From Peers:

"Janis Brothers' color photograph, Floater II, is familiar to us. We know beauties in water and Hamlet’s Ophelia is only for starters. Think also of Lars van Trier’s recent film Melancholia. Eduard Weston’s Floating Nude is the best of what we’re up against in this lineage. In Floater II the light passes through clear yet green water making the piece feel like illuminated stained glass with the figure as a beautiful la mort vitrined as if in formaldehyde. But the hair is not familiar. It is not rising in the water. It looks perfectly fixed as if in air.

What is it exactly that we are looking at? Mischievousness? Or a memory of real tragedy? I did come to learn after the judging that Janis Brothers had submitted a video piece of this underwater happening. I also learned that there was history of a drowning in her family. That video piece is something I would very much like to see."

Stephen Knudsen, Senior Editor of ARTPULSE magazine; Professor of Painting at the Savannah College of Art and Design; Contributing writer to the Huffington Post, Hyperallergic, and others; Senior Editor and compiler of the forthcoming anthology text The ART of Critique/Re-imagining Professional Art Criticism and the Art School Critique

"One particular piece left a lasting impression on me. I could not stop thinking about the haunting melancholy and visual poetry of the video entitled, That Was Then, This Is Now, by Janis Brothers. I found the imagery, rich and compelling, with darker, menacing threads running through it. I sensed an implied, yet very private narrative and found the piece conceptually deep and immensely intriguing."

Margaret Morrison, Assistant Professor at University of Georgia’s Lamar Dodd School of Art and juror for Valdosta National 2013.

"Despite the excellent quality of all of the selected works, I was overwhelmed by Janis Brothers’ video installation That Was Then/This Is Now Vigil, through which the artist speaks about personal experiences of place, life, memories and the loss of youth. Two projected and synchronized videos play on two walls located in the corner. The artist places a self-contained, steel-encased basin that contains dark water from the Suwannee River and is surrounded by river sand in the room. Another video is projected on the water’s surface, showing a dead girl floating face down. Brothers gives the viewer a voyeuristic glimpse into the rural, Southern culture in which she lives."

Denise Colson, Contributing Reviewer for Artdistricts Magazine in Miami reviewing the 2012 Biennial: Florida Installation Art at the Appleton Museum of Art; Artdistricts No. 19. August/September 2012; page 35.)

"I like to consider how a piece affects the senses. A work like Dust to Dust obviously affects all the senses and incorporates four dimensions. The wonderful textures of the copper plates and resin house a narrative with sound and motion. It is an enticing piece that beckons the viewer to interact. Its actual textures, sound and movement present challenges to the artist to contain and balance these effects. In addition, the piece is an intriguing narrative of spiritual / religious speculation or investigation."

Charles Williams, Associate Professor of Art at Albany State University and juror for Valdosta National 2012.

“It is not uncommon for artists to create work that aspires to disturb. But it is very rare that I am disturbed. The exception to this is Janis Brothers”…… “Brothers' art preserves and recreates the tragedies she's witnessed and suffered from, true, but just as a small town in the hands of William Faulkner can seem to contain the world, so can a single tragic car accident in the hands of Janis Brothers seem to crystalize the universal emotions, and questions, that we all experience in the face of death”….. “her work is careful and respectful, and she never loses sight of the individual who lived and was lost. And through that care and respect and clarity of vision, she makes us feel that moment, that universal sense of loss and tragedy.”

Amy Letter, Assistant Professor of Fiction and New Media, Drake University; "Art That Makes You Squirm"; "The Electronic Girl"; March 19, 2010; http://theelectronicgirl.blogspot.com/2010/03/art-that-makes-you-squirm.html