Gretchen Durst Jacobs
Resilient Convergence
Resilient Convergence
This exhibition explores the raw, intuitive energy that defines Abstract Expressionism—not as a singular style, but as a radical movement that gave voice to the internal landscapes of the artist. Born in the aftermath of war, and shaped by displacement, uncertainty, and a hunger for new forms of meaning, Abstract Expressionism emerged as a declaration of both autonomy and vulnerability.
Here, the gesture becomes language. Color and form are unbound from representation. What remains is immediacy: a direct transmission of emotion, memory, tension, and silence. Each work in this exhibition reflects a moment when the artist stepped away from the external world and into the unknown—risking clarity in favor of truth. The artwork explores the use of a grid, structure to contain chaos. In curating this collection, we honor not only the giants of the movement, but also the artists who continue to evolve its legacy—those who paint not what they see, but what they need to say. These works invite you to look beyond image and toward impact. To feel, not to decipher. To experience art not as an answer, but as a living question.
Artist Statement
My paintings begin with the body. I work at a scale that matches my full reach—fingertip to fingertip—so each mark records movement, presence, and intuition. The grid holds it all in place. It gives me something to push against. It's not about control, but containment—a way to hold chaos, memory, and motion all at once.
Though my work is abstract, it is shaped by 25 years of painting directly from observation. I grew up identifying birds, plants, and insects with my parents, both musicians and amateur naturalists. Summers on my grandparents’ farm taught me to read the weather, notice seasonal shifts, and understand time as cyclical. These rhythms still guide me. Nature wasn’t just a backdrop -- it was how I made sense of things, especially while growing up with a mother whose moods were unpredictable and overwhelming. I watched how the land adapted: trees bending around fallen trunks, still growing.
I use color, gesture, and layered marks to process the full spectrum of lived experience – grief, trauma, joy and survival. Sacred geometry appears as a structing force, a visual and emotional anchor. I am interested in how a line can hold chaos, how paint can become a kind of memory. Everything I make is an attempt to reconcile feeling with form, to honor what we carry, to map what cannot always be said.
Gallery Talk
September 11th, 5:30pm
Art in Motion
October 19th, 4pm
In this performance, choreographers step into dialogue with the visual world of Gretchen Durst Jacobs, drawing inspiration from her evocative exhibition Resilient Convergence. Jacobs’ work—layered, fluid, and fiercely intricate—captures the tension between fragility and strength, chaos and harmony, emergence and release. Her swirling forms and organic abstractions echo movement already in motion, as if her lines could lift from the canvas and breathe.
The choreographers, Countess V. Winfrey, Jennifer Sydon and Stevie Lamblin interpret Jacobs’ visual language into living motion—transforming brushstroke into gesture, texture into rhythm, stillness into momentum. Each dancer becomes both canvas and catalyst, embodying the resilience at the heart of convergence: where bodies, histories, visions, and energies collide not in conflict, but in powerful coexistence.
What you witness is not just interpretation—it is collaboration across medium and spirit. A fusion of ink and muscle, pigment and breath. A testament to endurance, reinvention, and the beauty found in becoming.
Countess V. Winfrey
Countess V. Winfrey currently serves as a performer, teaching artist, choreographer, and rehearsal director for The Dayton Contemporary Dance Company. Ms. Winfrey attended the University of Memphis, where she graduated Magna Cum Laude with a B.S. in Health and Human Performance, and a minor in Dance. Countess has performed nationally and internationally in Bermuda, China, Kazakhstan, and Russia. Additionally, she has taught and choreographed for DCDC, DCDC2, The Ohio State University, Miami University, The School for Creative and Performing Arts in Cincinnati, Ohio University, Regional Dance Association and more. Her most recent commissions include the world premiere of “huMAN/NAture” for DCDC, and the world premiere of “Homage: What was, Is, To Come”, commissioned by the Cincinnati Art Museum and Ohio Dance. Ms. Winfrey will be entering her 9th season dancing with the professional company and her 11th year with the organization.
Stevie Lamblin
I'm a freelance artist (no company affiliation)
Bio: Stevie Lamblin is a non-binary movement artist, choreographer, and licensed professional clinical mental health therapist from Dayton, Ohio. They have danced with DCDC2 (2012-2015), toured nationally and internationally with the Dayton Contemporary Dance Company (2016-2020), and performed with Mutual Dance Theatre (2021-2023) and as part of the Dayton Dance Initiative (2021-2023)--a collaboration between DCDC and Dayton Ballet.
Stevie has been choreographing for 2 years. They have created works for Mutual Dance Theatre, Synergy Dance Festival, Dayton Dance Initiative, Northern Kentucky University, Psychopomp's Chaos Festival in Los Angeles, California, and the Yes Dance Festival in Richmond, Virginia.
Jennifer Sydor
I began my dance training at The Dayton Ballet School and hold an MFA from University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and a BFA from Butler University.
I am in my seventeenth season as a dancer with The Metropolitan Opera and proudly serve as an elected member of The Met Opera’s Diversity Equity and Inclusion committee. I have worked with Tony Award winning directors such as Mary Zimmerman, Michael Grandage and Bartlett Sher and have appeared in The Met Opera's Live in HD broadcasts worldwide, and on PBS's Great Performances in the operas Manon, Don Giovanni, Armida, The Magic Flute, Turandot and La Sonnambula.
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