DESCRIPTION AND METHOD OF WORK

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Framed within carefully constructed containers are fragments from the past and images of the present. Visually complex, Dori Lemeh’s artworks are rich with idiosyncratic and familiar cultural symbols, such as hand-written text, swatches of fabric, strands of hair and photographic images. Literally packed with meaning, her compelling constructions encourage reflection. At first, they appear comparable to Joseph Cornell’s box assemblages. Closer inspection reveals evocative visual narratives inspired by her dreams of reconciliation among people.

FAVORITE SUBJECT MATTER

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Originally an expressionist landscape painter, Lemeh since has shifted her focus to the terrain of her own life. She says that her assemblages, mixed-media “box environs” and installations acknowledge a “constant struggle with the language of labels.” Throughout Lemeh’s work is a feminist critique of the female body. She aims to dissect what she calls the “social quagmire” of beliefs that lead to impersonal stereotypes.

FIRST ARTISTIC INSPIRATION

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The second of four children, Lemeh is the daughter of an African-American mother and a Nigerian father. Her cross-cultural, trans-Atlantic background encouraged her to pay careful attention to people, places and events in the world. Lemeh recalls looking out from her second-floor bedroom window as a young girl: “For some reason I felt determined to capture the likeness of what was before me,” she says. “It was then I realized I was going to be an artist.”

MOST INFLUENTIAL PERSON

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Though citing no single greatest influence, Lemeh credits innovative landscape painter Richard Mayhew, renowned Texas-based Chicana artist Santa Barraza, story quilt artist Faith Ringgold and painter Paul Zepelinsky as inspirations.

AWARDS AND ACCOLADES

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College Art Association Committee on Women in the Arts, 1999–2005; Florence Biennale of Contemporary Art, 1999; National Women’s Caucus for Art board member and conference co-chair, 1997; Southern Alleghenies Museum of Art Triennial VII Merit Award in Painting, 1999; Honorable Mention in “Images 1995,” the Central Pennsylvania Festival of the Arts, HUB Gallery, University Park, Pennsylvania.