Jamie Luoto lives and works in the San Francisco North Bay. Predominantly self-taught, Luoto’s intimate self-portraits explore the ways in which our identity is shaped, both from within ourselves and by society at large. Her current focus is on illuminating the lasting psychological impact of sexual trauma.
Luoto’s painting We Hunt the Doe was a semifinalist for the Smithsonian Institute’s Outwin Boochever Portrait Competition, 2022. Her work has been featured in publications such as Booooooom.com, ArtMaze Mag, and New American Paintings; appeared on platforms such as Juxtapoz and Hyperallergic; and is in international private and public collections including the Green Family Art Foundation (Dallas, USA).
Selected recent exhibitions include: (Upcoming) Jamie Luoto + Tonia Nneji, Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery, Berlin, Germany (2024, duo); (Upcoming) Mirror, Mirror, Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery, London, UK (2024); (Upcoming) Expo Chicago, Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery, Chicago, USA (2024); The de Young Open, de Young Museum, San Francisco, USA (2023); Nude, Manifest Gallery, Cincinnati, USA (2023); True North, di Rosa Center for Contemporary Art, Napa, USA (2022); Stories from My Childhood, Northern Illinois University Art Museum, DeKalb, USA (2022); All About Women, Marin Society of Artists’ Gallery, San Rafael, USA (2021); Chasing Ghosts V, Verum Ultimum Gallery, Portland, USA (2020); Art the Library Featuring Jamie L. Luoto, Napa County Library, Napa, USA (2019, solo); It’s Time: An Uncensored Look at the Time’s Up and #MeToo Movements, Orange County Center for Contemporary Art, Santa Ana, USA (2018); Pride and Prejudice: Gender Realities in the 21st Century, Arc Gallery, Chicago, USA (2018); Identity Spectrum, Susquehanna Art Museum, Harrisburg, USA (2018).
Statement
I believe in ghosts. I believe those who weren’t and won’t be believed. I see the ghosts that haunt us.
This series of painted self-portraits give a first person survivor’s account to create a deeply intimate encounter between artist, subject, and viewer. I bring to light the aftermath of sexual assault by illuminating the lasting psychological impact of repeated sexual trauma on an individual. The “me too” movement exposed the breadth of sexual violence — this work reveals the depth to which these acts of violence and the accompanying dismissal, disbelief, and shaming impact individuals.
In these works I explore my psyche and experience with complex post-traumatic stress disorder (C-PTSD), blurring the line between external presentation and internal reality to bring to light the unseen injuries of sexual trauma that invade and haunt mind and body. Symptoms such as flashbacks, nightmares, dissociation, and intrusive thoughts and images are suggested using mirrors, portraits within portraits, and phallic forms, such as condoms and erect sheets, which materialize as ghosts throughout the work. At times the ghosts’ presence takes on a swarm-like quality, suggesting a looming threat. Felines act as familiars; bearing witness and embodying the subject’s emotional state.
Using the visual language of European masterworks, I manipulate the familiar to reframe classic imagery and narratives. I invoke the spectacle of visual pleasure as a means to beguile the viewer while encircling them with an undercurrent of perverse imagery. Together the collective body of work functions as an installation intended to actualize an experience akin to the inescapability of living in a body haunted by sexual trauma.