Jessica Burko
59 Wareham Street, 5th Fl.
www.jessicaburko.com on Instagram
Jessica Burko is a practicing artist who creates process-oriented work including photographic mixed-media, site-specific installation, and layered compositions with paint and debris. She has exhibited her work since 1985 in galleries and museums throughout the US and internationally in venues including Kellogg University Art Gallery (Cal Poly, Pomona, CA), Danforth Museum (Framingham, MA), and the Maine Museum of Photographic Arts (Portland, ME). She holds a BFA from Rhode Island School of Design, and an MFA from Rochester Institute of Technology. In addition to her own practice, Burko is immersed in the arts community as an organizer, teacher, curator, and coach. She leads professional workshops through organizations such as Assets 4 Artists and works one-on-one with creatives to guide their process of gaining visibility in the art world, by building a path to reach their creative and professional goals. As a curator, Burko has produced more than 40 exhibitions in her career, and she is currently the Board President of the United South End Artists and Coordinator of the South End Open Studios. Jessica Burko is originally from Philadelphia and currently lives and works in Boston, Massachusetts.
The thematic focus of my work grows out of investigations of identity and how one reconciles the uniquely contemporary experience of being a woman expected to excel in one's professional field, while also as a nurturer, chef, housekeeper, chauffeur, bookkeeper, event planner, and seductress. My work is a visualization of the chaos of managing a hyphenated identity, the emotions of battling social media standards and navigating contradictions between asserting an identity as an individual and one who serves others. My process-oriented projects including photographic mixed-media, modular installation, and layered compositions with paint and debris.