Twilley Time Travelers

Jonathan Twilley, Rebecca Twilley, Nicholas Twilley, Brandi Twilley

Curated by Wells Chandler

March 31 - May 5, 2024

Opening: Sunday, March 31, 5-7pm

Psychatry 605

Flip a coin.  

Roll the die.  

Hop in the middle third of time.  

Back to the future.  

The future is now. 

February 10. 2024 I am sitting in the corner booth at Chelios Diner in Oklahoma City, OK with four wizards.  Nicholas dumps a Scarface mountain amount of white sugar in his Sunkist.  He adorns his beverage with talismans that crossed Brandi’s path earlier that day at Mary’s Swap Meet.  His hands twitch and repeat movements to keep himself safe.  With a toy pig dangling from the rim, Nicholas’ beverage is now activated as a time machine.  Jonathan is preoccupied.  He has been busy negotiating treaties with China.  He lights up, telling us about his four story dreamhouse.  It is equipped with a square shaped spiral staircase located conveniently in the center of bookcases that stretch three stories high, a suitable structure to support his unstoppable drawing habit.  His work is currently stored in over thirty binders.  Jonathan asks me if I can decipher the coordinates for time travel in his drawings.  Rebecca Twilley is a white witch.  She practices psychatry, a psychic healing praxis that incorporates talk therapy and dream analysis.  Nature’s Treasures is her favorite magic store.  Channeling spirits, she makes copious drawings to face her demons and heal her sister.  Brandi dreams.  She uses this altered state to make her paintings.  Woodgrain, water stains, surfaces patinaed with decay; her memory recalls every uncanny detail of her childhood home.  Chicken fried steak, okra and mashed potatoes are a-plenty.

February 9. 2024 I am standing in the Twilley family kitchen.  Every cupboard is wide open and filled with Instant Ramen, Hungry Man, and VHS tapes.  Both fridges are broken.  Soiled plates pile high.  Nicholas is visiting with us. Without trying, he is the pinnacle of hipster fashion.  His slight frame frequents various self-determined yoga poses. I ask Nicholas, “Do you believe in reincarnation?”  He answers, “I believe in soda pop.” Nicholas and Brandi both like cans, especially the tabs.  “The sound as it opens,” fills Nicholas with glee.  Earlier that day we sprung Rebecca from Red Rock.  All of her new friends are excited about her show.  Hoping to spot the Tulsa Kings, we had lunch at Chelios.  Brandi tells Rebecca, “You need to change your Latuda.”  

I have known Brandi for fifteen years.  By fate we met in graduate school.  We joke that Peter Halley’s alchemical Sim Universe became material reality.  As above, so below. Occult electricity reverberates in the meat of the analog.

February 11. 2024 A young woman behind the counter at Braums asks us if we are related.  I answer, “No. We are cosmic siblings.”  She looks at us strangely.  We grin back with twinning Beaker frowny smiles.  

Jonathan, Rebecca, Brandi and Nicholas understand that linear time is an illusion.  History repeats itself.  They survived three house fires occurring in 1999, 2004 and 2019.  Brandi has made several bodies of work exploring this subject.  In 2022, both of their parents died, their father from Covid in March and their mother from cancer in August.  All four siblings are time travelers in their own special way.  They wish they could travel to the future like Rick and Morty to be healed.  Nicholas is working on a code to travel back in time to bring back his father.  When recited correctly, his numerical sequence will unravel the events that led to his father’s death.  

All four artists are equally prolific. Their output of drawings, paintings and sculptures is hard to match.  Art is a means to survive, make meaning and access joy despite overwhelming hardship.  In 2021 Brandi returned home, discovering the work of her brothers.  She has shown with her sister twice prior.  Twilley Time Travelers is their first exhibition together as a family.  

Soloway is pleased to present Twilley Time Travelers, a group exhibition of paintings, drawings and sculptures by Jonathan Twilley, Rebecca Twilley, Nicholas Twilley and Brandi Twilley, curated by Wells Chandler.  Twilley Time Travelers opens Sunday March 31st with a reception from 5-7pm and runs through May 5th.  A catalog of the artists’ work will be available for purchase, alongside commemorative coins and stickers.

-Text by Wells Chandler

 Brandi Twilley (b. 1982, Oklahoma City, OK) lives and works in Oklahoma City, OK. She received her MFA from Yale University in 2011. She has recently exhibited at Charles Moffett (New York, NY), Josh Lilley (London, UK), 1969 Gallery (New York, NY), Zero Gallery (Milan, Italy), The Museum of Sex (New York, NY), and Kate Werble Gallery (New York, NY). She has had four solo presentations at Sargent’s Daughters (New York, NY). Her work has been reviewed in The New York Times, ARTFORUM, ARTnews, The Art Newspaper, The New Yorker, Artnet News, Time Out, The Observer, and Hyperallergic, among other publications. She is represented by Sargent’s Daughters.

Jonathan Twilley (b. 1988, Oklahoma City, OK) lives and works in Oklahoma City, OK.  Twilley Time Travelers is his first exhibition.

Rebecca Twilley (b. 1986, Oklahoma City, OK) lives and works in Oklahoma, OK.  Twilley Time Travelers is her third show.  She exhibited previously in 2017 at Bible in New York in a two person show with Brandi titled Birdy in the Chains and Nails and in 2015 at Aka Gallery in Oklahoma City, OK.

Nicholas Twilley (b. 1992, Oklahoma City, OK) lives and works in Oklahoma, OK.  Twilley Time Travelers is his first exhibition.