ARTIST

Jen Harmon Allen spent her youth studying dance, sensitizing her to the “body's own power for making words, both in movement and in stillness.” Today, she draws on this sensitivity by using the female figure as the subject of her art. She says her work is “about the female body, though not so much its minutest details as its graceful presence.”

Her installation works are almost ghost-like, as seen in her dresses. These dresses are exhibited elsewhere as a group installation for a time and then brought into the gallery to be sold as individual pieces. They are sentimental at heart, using clothing from a certain era to suggest a personal moment in time. Seemingly at odds with the dresses, paintings of insects and animals on the surface of each dress reflect the world outside the body.

Jen Harmon Allen was born and raised in Connecticut. She attended Wellesley College, studying under the sculptor Carlos Dorrien, and received her M.F.A. from Brigham Young University. She is currently a professional artist living in Wallsburg, Utah.