In the wake of the pandemic, we have a national awakening of priorities on how we live. My work takes the traditional vanitas rendering that has been around for centuries, but with content relevant to the 21st century. Emojis, our modern hieroglyph, is utilized in some of the work to convey the temporality of emotion and to reference disconnect of what is directly in front of us.

James Ehlers earned his MFA from the University of Florida and is currently the Department Chair and the Don and Mary Glaser Distinguished Professor of Engraving Arts at Emporia State University in Kansas.