My work attempts to shapeshift and transform fleeting moments of joy, isolation, power, and friendship into something more lasting and fluid. How can I make material these ephemeral experiences so that we can reflect on them, revisit them, and remember them in all their ecstasies and agonies?
— Dianna Settles
Dianna Settles is a Vietnamese-American artist in Atlanta, Georgia who received her BFA from the San Francisco Art Institute in 2014. Her current work explores moments of joyful stillness amidst the cascading series of crises called modern life, accomplished through her synthesis of traditional Vietnamese and classical European painting styles.
Recent exhibition highlights include a solo show titled Olly Olly Oxen Free at Institute 193 in Lexington, KY and a group show with Gerald Lovell and Jurell Cayetano at MINT in Atlanta. As the inaugural artist of Living Walls’ international exchange program, she completed the 180' long mural To Our Friends / Á Nos Amis in Paris, France in July of 2019, adding to her portfolio of work as a muralist in Atlanta, Oakland, and Pittsburgh. She was a finalist for the 2019 Forward Arts Foundation Edge Award, and was recently accepted into the Atlanta Contemporary Studio Artist Program.
In addition to her own art practice, Dianna runs Hi-Lo Press, a print studio and art gallery in Atlanta.
Born in Los Alamitos, California in 1989
Lives and works in Atlanta, Georgia
Education
| 2014 |
BFA, San Francisco Art Institute, San Francisco, CA |
Solo Exhibitions
| 2021 |
Institute 193, ‘Olly Olly Oxen Free’, Lexington, KY |
| 2018 |
Versa Gallery, ‘99 Flowers’, Chattanooga, TN |
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Hi-Lo Press, ‘99 Flowers’, Atlanta, GA |
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| 2015 | Runaway Studio, ‘HI LO’, Pittsburgh, PA |
| 2014 | Octane, ‘Sudden Cinder’, Atlanta, GA |
| 2012 | Octane, ‘No Place Like Home’, Atlanta, GA |
Group Exhibitions
| 2021 |
MARCH, ‘Pre-Renovation Potluck’, Manhattan, NY |
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MINT Gallery ‘Jurell Cayetano, Gerald Lovell, Dianna Settles’, Atlanta, GA |
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| 2020 |
Swan Coach House Gallery, ‘Nightwork: 2020 EDGE Award Exhibition’, Atlanta, GA |
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MINT Gallery, ‘Semblance, Juried Exhibition’, Atlanta, GA |
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| 2019 |
Delaplane, ‘The One That Got Away’, San Francisco, CA |
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High Museum, ‘Of Origins and Belonging’, Atlanta, GA |
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(Mural) 10eme District, ‘To Our Friends | À Nos Amis’, Paris, France |
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Hartsfield-Jackson Intl Airport, ‘artintheATL’, Atlanta, GA |
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Factory Atlanta, ‘Art Crush’, Atlanta, GA |
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| 2018 |
Trio Gallery, ‘In These Streets’, Athens, GA |
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Southern Exchange Ballroom, ‘Art Papers Auction’, Atlanta, GA |
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Collect on Sunday, ‘Bodies of Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow’, Atlanta, GA |
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Wish Gallery, ‘HER RITUAL’, Atlanta, GA |
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ADAC, ‘Hambidge Auction’, Atlanta, GA |
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Mammal Gallery, ‘WREKtacular’, Atlanta, GA |
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Zuckerman Museum of Art, ‘Time Like the Present’, Kennesaw, GA |
Residency
| 2020 |
Atlanta Contemporary Studio Artist Program |
Award-Grant
| 2019 |
Forward Arts Foundation Edge Award |
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Dianna SettlesOn the stroll of the stolen life (ripe for the taking), 2022Acrylic and colored pencil on panel30.5 x 20.3 x 5.7 cm
12 x 8 x 2 1/4 in -
Dianna SettlesSummer Is Not All (the chickens try to eat embroidered butterflies off garments and we follow their cue to pursue our wants, our whims, our hungers), 2022Acrylic, oil, colored pencil on panel76.2 x 61 cm
30 x 24 in -
Dianna SettlesMay the land grow green, May it swallow our mistakes (this year we won’t dig the trenches so deep), 2021Acrylic, oil, colored pencil on panel76.2 x 61 cm
30 x 24 in -
Dianna SettlesSelf-portrait after Elin Danielson-Gambogi’s ‘After Breakfast’, 2021Acrylic, oil, colored pencil on canvas40.6 x 50.8 cm
16 x 20 in -
Dianna SettlesThe warm and hot baths’ insistence on our porosity: confine your measure to the boundary of the sky (water is the only one who knows what has always been), 2021Acrylic, colored pencil81.3 x 121.9 cm
32 x 48 in -
Dianna SettlesThe way out is across, in ardor (That Spring when the deer who had been ravaging the field was hit by a car one morning and the farmers came to weed the field and found her in the road, still warm), 2021Acrylic and colored pencil on panel32 × 24 in
81.3 x 61 cm -
Dianna SettlesThey came to eat the moon again (does anyone feel like cooking this week?), 2021Acrylic, oil, colored pencil on panel63.5 x 63.5 cm
25 x 25 in -
Dianna SettlesWe must exist more and heavier // we are learning discipline everyday, Bench pressing, jiu-jitsu training, training for our future study We must exist more and heavier // we are learning discipline everyday, Bench pressing, jiu-jitsu training, training , 2021Acrylic, colored pencil on panel81.3 x 121.9 cm
32 x 48 in
