ANDREA HARDIN GARLAND

ARTIST BIO

Andrea Garland is a Southern American artist who was raised on family land in the mountains of
upstate South Carolina. She holds the role of Assistant Professor of Fine Arts at North Greenville
University. She earned a BFA from Winthrop University and an MFA from Clemson University. Her
artistic influences include Rachel Whiteread, Do Ho Suh, and Dario Robleto. With a drive to
research the history of the South and to illustrate its impact, Garland creates mixed media works
on paper. Her work features embossed impressions of inherited textiles that are manipulated
through a ritual of pressing, rinsing, and reapplying media. Through her process, Garland seeks to
reflect on the lingering presence of the past and its continued influence on contemporary life in the
South. Garland has exhibited her work in galleries and publications across the United States, as
well as in numerous academic and competitive exhibitions throughout the Southeast. In December
of 2025, she was awarded First Place in the category of painting and drawing from the Women
United Art Prize, an international competition.


ARTIST STATEMENT

A persistent mingling of reverence and grief haunts the landscape and the people of the American South. Decades of generational legacies compel us to faithful stewardship of our regional, local, and family stories and artifacts. Woven throughout our history are tales of fierce allegiance to place, respect for heritage and kin, and a sense of stoic dignity. To distil these ideas into images, I emboss inherited linens onto archival paper.

These items were once either cherished for their beauty or valued for their utility. They languish in our closets, linger on our shelves, and inhabit the drawers of our bureaus, quietly reminding us of people whose lives demonstrated determination, resourcefulness in scarcity, and the satisfaction of making things by hand.

As I draw onto the impressions, the media clings to the raised textures of the embossing, producing soft, ghostly images. Reflecting on the care I have witnessed the women of my family undertake with their linens, I hand-wash the drawings. I flow water over them, gently wring them out, and allow them to dry. Residue from the initial process remains on the paper's surface, and I selectively add and remove media to revive the silhouette of the embossing. Completing the homage to heritage, I present some works in custom-built frames of local, reclaimed, or salvaged wood, some of which is over 100 years old.

The physicality of my process, which involves applying pressure, washing, wringing, and reshaping these pieces, serves as a metaphor for the tension that we and our homeland experience as we navigate inevitable change. Upholding our distinct traditions while recognizing all facets of our past enables us to honestly and respectfully preserve and honor our Southern Culture.