Roberto Jamora

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Roberto Jamora was born in 1987 in Annapolis, MD and grew up in Virginia Beach, VA. He holds a BFA in Painting and Printmaking from Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) and an MFA in Visual Arts from Purchase College, State University of New York (SUNY). He currently lives and works in Richmond, VA and is an Adjunct Professor at VCU School of the Arts. He was an Emerging Artist-Teacher Fellow at Joan Mitchell Foundation and also taught at Purchase College, SUNY. He was awarded a 2018 Artist Community Engagement Grant from the Rema Hort Mann Foundation for his project “An Inventory of Traces,” a series of abstract paintings inspired by the stories of immigrants in NYC. Previously, he has participated in artist residencies at Joan Mitchell Center, Ragdale, and Sambalikhaan. He is currently working on two series of abstract paintings. One series deals with systems in sports and the other series explores how color triggers memory. His work has been included in exhibitions at the Frost Art Museum, Contemporary Art Center of New Orleans, Topaz Arts, Page Bond Gallery, ADA Gallery, JuiceBox Art Space, Norte Maar, Shockoe Artspace, Good Enough Projects, Quality Gallery, Scott Charmin Gallery, Fouladi Projects, The Gaylord & Dorothy Donnelly Foundation, Open Space, Outlet Fine Art, and ArtHelix.

Born 1987, Annapolis, MD
Lives and works in Richmond, VA

 

EDUCATION

2013
MFA Visual Arts, State University of New York at Purchase

2009
BFA Painting and Printmaking, Virginia Commonwealth University

 

SELECT SOLO EXHIBITIONS

2020
Where were we?, FLXST Contemporary, Chicago, IL

2019
An Inventory of Traces, Page Bond Gallery, Richmond, VA

2018
Home Field Advantage, Sandler Center for the Performing Arts Gallery, VA Beach, VA
Marks and Conversations, Topaz Arts, Queens, NY (with Maeve D’arcy)
Salon Saturday, Norte Maar, Brooklyn, NY

2017
Visitor, Shockoe Artspace, Richmond, VA

2009
Postcolonial Power Hour, VCU Commons Gallery, Richmond, VA (with Chino Amobi)

 

SELECT GROUP EXHIBITIONS

2022

Shelter (curated by Heather Hakimzadeh and Alison Byrne), Virginia Museum of Contemporary Art, Virginia Beach, VA
Tambayan (curated by Edmund Arévalo), VAMA Gallery, Los Angeles, CA
Od „abstrakcji” do abstrakcji, Fundacja Stefana Gierowskiego, Warsaw, Poland
Local Economy (curated by Joelle Wacker), Gallery5, Richmond, VA

2021
Good Will, Page Bond Gallery, Richmond, VA
Down the Line, Page Bond Gallery, Richmond, VA
Embrace (curated by Deanna Evans), Maake Projects, State College, PA
Poets, Page Bond Gallery, Richmond, VA
Sentiment (curated by Sophia Chizuco), SFA Projects, New York, NY
Genesis, Eden Airlines, Richmond, VA

2020
Glean, Page Bond Gallery, Richmond, VA
Index, Page Bond Gallery, Richmond, VA
New Waves 2020 (juried by Susan Thompson), Virginia Museum of Contemporary Art, Virginia Beach, VA
Reaching for the Horizon (curated by Jan Christian Bernabe), Antenna, New Orleans, LA

2019
Confluence of Colors, Walter Wickiser Gallery, New York, NY
Current Art Fair, Page Bond Gallery, Richmond, VA
All We Want Is to See Ourselves, FLXST Contemporary, Chicago, IL
Notes on Abstraction, FLXST Contemporary, Chicago, IL (forthcoming)
New Editions: Into the FLXST, FLXST Contemporary, Chicago, IL
Cut: Abstraction in the United States from the 1970s to the Present (curated by Amy Galpin), Frost Art Museum, Miami, FL
Taglish, The First Picture of You, 1990 (curated by Dogeaters Collective), Philippine Center, New York, NY

2018
Gather, Page Bond Gallery, Richmond, VA
Constructing the Break, Contemporary Art Center of New Orleans, New Orleans, LA
Hot! Hot! Hot!, Page Bond Gallery, Richmond, VA
Everybody in the Pool, ADA Gallery, Richmond, VA
Fool, Juice Box, Denver, CO

2017
Current Art Fair, Shockoe Art Space, Richmond, VA
NURTUREart Annual Benefit, Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts, New York, NY

2016

From Tha Roota To Tha Toota, Good Enough Gallery, Atlanta, GA
daydreamer II, Quality Gallery, Oakland, CA
Obstructed Views, Scott Charmin Gallery, Houston, TX (curatorial project)
Sunny – A Summer Store, Fouladi Projects, San Francisco, CA
The Heart of the Matter (curated by Jessica Cochran), The Gaylord & Dorothy Donnelly Foundation, Chicago, IL

 

2015

SHIM Invitational 1, ArtHelix, Brooklyn, NY
NURTUREart Annual Benefit, The Boiler, Brooklyn, NY
Daang-Krus (curated by Ged Merino), Bliss on Bliss Art Projects, Queens, NY
SIXTY MINUTES: Sixty Artists & Sixty Seconds of Video (curated by Courtney Childress), Vanity Projects, Miami, FL & New York, NY
Surface Matters (curated by Russell Tyler), Fouladi Projects, San Francisco, CA
Working Artist, Academic Gallery, Queens, NY

 

AWARDS AND HONORS

2022-2025
Curatorial Board Member, Ragdale Foundation

2022
Dean’s Faculty Summer Research Grant, Virginia Commonwealth University

2021-2022
Asian Centennial Distinguished Fine Arts Fellow, William & Mary

2020
New Waves 2020 Honorable Mention, Virginia Museum of Contemporary Art

2020
Guest Lecturer, William & Mary, Asian & Pacific Islander American Studies

2020
Art Awards Juror (Painting), Scholastic Art & Writing Awards

2019
November All Media Show Juror, Art Works, Richmond, VA

2018
New York Emerging Artist Grant Nomination, Rema Hort Mann Foundation

2018
Artist Community Engagement Grant, Rema Hort Mann Foundation

2017
New York Emerging Artist Grant Nomination, Rema Hort Mann Foundation

2014
Emerging Artist-Teacher Fellowship, Joan Mitchell Foundation
New York Emerging Artist Grant Nomination, Rema Hort Mann Foundation

2012

Minority Graduate Fellowship, SUNY Purchase College, School of Art+Design
SUNY Graduate Fellowship, SUNY Purchase College, School of Art+Design

2011

Merit Scholarship, SUNY Purchase College, School of Art+Design

2008

Theresa Pollak Scholarship, VCU School of the Arts
Bon Air Artists Association Scholarship, VCU School of the Arts

 

ARTIST RESIDENCIES

2022
Jentel Artist Residency, Banner, WY
VCCA-France Moulin à Nef, Auvillar, France

2021
Muscarelle Museum of Art, Williamsburg, VA
Hambidge Center, Rabun Gap, GA

2019
Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, Amherst, VA

2018
Ragdale Foundation, Lakeside, IL

2017
Joan Mitchell Center, New Orleans, LA

2013
Ragdale Foundation, Lake Forest, IL

2010
Sambalikhaan Foundation, Quezon City, Philippines

 

TEACHING EXPERIENCE

2021-Present

Assistant Professor + Area Head, Surface Research (2D Foundations), Virginia Commonwealth University, School of the Arts, Art Foundation Program

2021-Present

Adjunct Lecturer, Filipino Diaspora Studies, William & Mary, Asian & Pacific Islander American Studies

2021

Adjunct Instructor, 2-D Portfolio Development, Virginia Commonwealth University, School of the Arts, Pre-College Summer Intensive Program

2018- 2021

Adjunct Instructor, Drawing Studio, Virginia Commonwealth University, School of the Arts, Art Foundation Program

2015

Instructor for Youth and Pre-College Programs in the Arts. Purchase College, State University of New York, Purchase, NY
Art Instructor, Private Picassos, New York, NY

2014-15

Emerging Artist-Teacher Fellow , Joan Mitchell Foundation, New York, NY

2012-13

Adjunct Instructor for “Introduction to Drawing”, Purchase College, State University of New York, Purchase, NY

2011

Graduate Teaching Assistant , Purchase College, State University of New York, Purchase, NY

 

SELECT COLLECTIONS

Atlanta Hawks NBA Team, Atlanta, GA
Capital One Art Collection, Richmond, VA
Harvard University, John F. Kennedy School of Government, Cambridge, MA
Muscarelle Museum of Art, Williamsburg, VA
Taller de Experimentación Plástica – Conarte, Monterrey, Nuevo Leon, Mexico

 

GALLERY REPRESENTATION

FLXST Contemporary, Chicago, IL

Page Bond Gallery, Richmond, VA

Each gradient is a vignette of an experience or place in my Passing Memories series. I attempt to commit important events in my life to memory via painting. I mine color from memory and photos I’ve taken/have been tagged in on social media. Cold wax and oil paint are swiped across the canvas to conceal extraneous possibilities and to limit sentimentality. A thin trace of landscape is revealed. Skin tones, days at the beach, climbing a mountain with a lover, my parents’ backyard, a city sidewalk, the bayous in Louisiana where my ancestors once lived. Color triggers these recollections.

Earlier in 2018, I had the privilege of receiving an Artist Community Engagement Grant from the Rema Hort Mann Foundation to fund my socially engaged paintings. The title of my project, An Inventory of Traces, is inspired by Edward Said’s Orientalism where Said writes “In many ways my study of Orientalism has been an attempt to inventory the traces upon me, the Oriental subject, of the culture whose domination has been so powerful a factor in the life of all Orientals.” Thru abstraction, I wanted to celebrate the lives of immigrants. I met with immigrant artists and writers in NYC to learn about the traces the world has left upon them. Their stories inspired the color, composition, and literal traces on my paintings for which I am so grateful.