Corey Helford Gallery is proud to premiere Jasmine Becket-Griffith ’s newest solo show, Magical Thinking, on Saturday, July 28 in the Main Gallery , with an opening reception from 7pm to 11pm. This is Becket-Griffith’s second solo show with Corey Helford. Two years in the making, Magical Thinking will premiere twenty new acrylic paintings and over a dozen small-scale studies, as well as the debut of her first-ever large-scale sculptural installation.

“I love the term ‘Magical Thinking,’” says Becket-Griffith. “It has the unapologetically optimistic feel of being a euphemistic term for ‘positive vibes,’ but it is also technically a psychological disorder indicating the inappropriately fallacious attribution of cause and effect between actions and events, with sometimes sinister implications. Being a painter, a (very) amateur philosopher, and a dilettante in various scientific and mathematical fields, I find myself gravitating towards the idea of Magical Thinking, Sympathetic Magic, and my own rampant OCD when it comes to finding signs and symbols in everyday life that strike a chord in my subconscious. Whether it's the unexpected juxtaposition between patterns and designs, words and colours, meanings and abstractions—I find myself combining permutations of symbolic images with things I find aesthetically pleasing and cerebrally interesting and this collection of paintings displays the results graphically.”

Magical Thinking will explore Becket-Griffith’s fantastical world in a way she has not done before, with each work revealing meticulously crafted juxtapositions between the expressions, moods, and patterns of the ethereal, big-eyed fairies, familiars, dragonlings, mermaids and more that inhabit each portrait. The show will be comprised of works ranging from 8” x 10” to large-scale 36” x 48.” One of her most famous characters, a mermaid named “Porcelina” with a Blue Willow porcelain patterned tail, will be recreated as a 72” sculptural installation in collaboration with a New Orleans-based prop studio. This will be Becket-Griffith’s first time creating a sculptural piece of this scale.