Tilly Woodward: Quiet Histories 2026

Tilly Woodward Quiet Histories

SHERRY LEEDY CONTEMPORARY ART

Histories

MARCH 21, 2026

Director: Sherry Leedy • Catalog Design: Celina Curry @sherryleedycontemporaryart • FB: @sherryleedycontemporaryart This page: Cicada Cicada

Quiet Histories

In Quiet Histories, Tilly Woodward centers her attention on small, often overlooked objects. Rather than working at a monumental scale, she focuses on intimacy and careful observation. According to Woodward, the exhibition considers “what could easily be overlooked, but that… holds a special power.” The work reflects a long shift away from the bold, confrontational approach emphasized during her early training and toward something more contemplative and connective.

Woodward grew up on an isolated Midwestern farm, where time moved differently and close observation was part of daily life. She watched crops rise and fall, birds build and abandon nests, and seasons reshape the landscape. That early experience still informs her practice. She describes her way of thinking as attentive to “the details within the details. The physical, the chemical, the cultural. The emotional, the spiritual.” In her paintings, individual objects carry traces of people, places, and memory.

Nests appear frequently throughout the exhibition. Built from gathered fragments of grass, thread, hair, and bits of debris, they suggest care, labor, and vulnerability. Woodward often pairs these natural forms with everyday manufactured objects: a baseball, a spoon, a fork. A nest placed beside a baseball recalls the shape of a mitt. Two fish and a spoon read almost like an equation. These combinations are quiet but deliberate, encouraging viewers to notice relationships between materials and meanings.

Since turning to smaller formats in 2007, Woodward has committed to a scale that requires precision and sustained focus. The work unfolds slowly. “The paintings are about patience,” she says, describing “the effort it takes to paint the spaces between.” That patience stands in contrast to a culture increasingly shaped by speed and digital distraction.

Painting offers Woodward a steady framework for attention. Though she acknowledges that a painting is “just some oil and pigment moved around on a surface,” she also understands its capacity to hold memory and create shared space. Many of the objects she paints are brought to her by others, an indication that her community, too, recognizes value in small things.

Quiet Histories asks viewers to slow down. The works reward sustained looking and suggest that meaning accumulates quietly. In Woodward’s paintings, modest objects become anchors - reminders of care, connection, and the significance of paying attention.

on panel

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