Elysa Adams

MFA Printmaking

Instagram

Love In Passing Time

Love in Passing Time reflects on how the Black church has molded my understanding of faith, family, and community. Working across relief, screenprint, sculpture, and sound, my practice explores how knowledge is shared across generations through music, tradition, and adornment.

The exhibition draws on my upbringing as a pastor’s child, in which the church serves as both a spiritual and communal home. These experiences appear through sculptural paper garments based on childhood memories, carved wooden fans, tambourines featuring the faces of people who have impacted my life, carved portraits of my grandparents, and pew-like structures that reference the architecture of worship spaces.

Rather than remaining on a flat surface, my work extends into installation, allowing these memories and experiences to be felt rather than just seen. Through this approach, I create interactive spaces that reflect the Black church’s role as a place of care, continuity, and culture.

Triangular pyramid of ten wooden tambourines. The faces on the tambourine show magenta, cyan, yellow, and deep purple. Screen-printed portraits of the artist’s family and traditions that occur in a church setting, such as baptisms, praise, and worship.

Praise
Screenprint
10"

Ten wooden screenprinted tambourines arranged in a pyramid. Tambourines are often used in church as musical instruments to accompany praise and worship. Faces of the tambourines feature images of church traditions—baptisms, praise, and worship—as well as portraits of the artist’s mother, sister-in-law, brother, nieces, and nephews.

A large-scale woodcut in black and white. Portrait of the artist’s grandparents, Arthur and Cynthia Adams. Cynthia stands behind Arthur, hands on his shoulder. Cynthia wears patterned African fabric, and Arthur wears a black shirt with a patterned tie.

Arthur & Cynthia
Woodcut
4 x 8'

Large-scale woodcut featuring the artist’s paternal grandparents, Arthur and Cynthia Adams, Pastor and First Lady of the artist’s childhood church. Cynthia stands behind Arthur, hands on his shoulders. Cynthia wears a patterned African print dress and hat; Arthur wears a black shirt with a patterned tie.

A large-scale black and white woodcut of the artist family’s brick church in Jacksonville, Florida.

Community Revival
Woodcut
4 x 2'

A large-scale woodcut of the artist's childhood church.

In Three
Woodcut
6.5 x 7"

Three black and white wooden fans featuring Christian symbols: a dove with an olive branch, praying hands, and a miniature church that reads praise house. Fans are used for cooling, displaying religious iconography, memorializing loved ones at homegoings or advertisement for funeral homes.

Two socks with images of the artist as a child preparing for church. Socks topped with white lace; black leather shoes with jeweled flower buckle.

Miss Missionary
Digital Print, Fabric, Paper, Acrylic Paint
42 x 21"

Digital prints cut into sock shapes, featuring images of the artist as a young child preparing for church. Each sock is topped with white lace and placed inside black leather shoes with jeweled buckles, a common church adornment for young girls. Titled after the artist's childhood nickname, Miss Missionary, given to her for caring for other children as a child.