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Cassandra Chalfant’s acrylics are snapshots of life, paintings that gather her memories and visions, echoing the look and feel of photographs.
In her series For You and For Me, Polaroid-style images capture landscapes and, at times, figures with the same fleeting quality as family-trip snapshots. Emotions spark again, sudden, ephemeral, like the click of a camera freezing a moment.
Cassandra paints her memories, turning them into souvenirs that invite remembrance.
In For Them and the Untitled collection, Chalfant works in postcard format, those postcards no one sends anymore. Here, they come back to life, tinted with the “antique” colors of vistas we’ve glimpsed in the past.
A mountain scene washed in soft whites and greys becomes a postcard to tack on the kitchen board, right next to Self-Monitoring Farm, and a Polaroid of relatives lined up before a lake.
Memories layering over other memories.
In Objects in Space, a panel becomes a cabinet of moments, maybe Cassandra’s, maybe someone else’s, where a broken heart, a padlock, a winner’s gold medal, the inevitable Polaroid, and assorted keepsakes become cameos of life. Fleeting appearances that resurface again and again in the restless flow of existence.
The works become stage sets: Stroudsburg, PA; Columbus Grove, OH and we wait for the actors. As in The Store, abandonment pools into a sinister beam of light that illuminates a single bottle. Plastic, maybe? The last one?
In The Highway, a different kind of waiting: endless lines of cars, wrecks at the horizon, the accident that stops everyone, those who wanted to follow Exit 20 7A, to escape along Lincoln Street, chasing the Broadway dream.
Based near Denver, Colorado, Cassandra Chalfant holds a BFA in Painting & Drawing and, since 2016, a specialization in Political Science from Tyler School of Art at Temple University, Philadelphia. Her extensive travels across the U.S. have shaped her vision, drawing inspiration from landscapes and environments in constant flux. Her work explores recurring themes: the meaning of place; family history and mental health; collecting and our attachment to objects; and the ties between technology, images, and the self.
Her exhibitions include Eternal Return (Bountiful Davis Art Center, UT, 2026 – Upcoming), Contemporary Art Survey(The Lincoln Center Art Gallery, Fort Collins, CO, 2025), and Colorado Juried (Red Brick Center for the Arts, Aspen, CO, 2025).
Her paintings have also been featured in Space on Space Magazine: Issue No. 3, New American Paintings: Issue 162, and the White Columns Artist Registry.
