In her meticulously rendered small-scale paintings, Hilary Harkness fuses traditional techniques with a distinctly contemporary sensibility to explore power struggles inherent in sex, race, and class systems on an uncensored stage. Working in episodic series that take years to complete, Harkness wields unparalleled skill and imagination to elevate the stories and intersectional experiences of women, people of color, and LGBTQIA+ people.

Hilary Harkness: Everything for You is a fascinating and long-overdue study into the nuanced practice of Hilary Harkness, offering a chance to plunge into the artist’s invented worlds that teem with inescapable human foibles that plague each of us, making it relatable and resonant with viewers across a broad and global spectrum.  

Featuring texts by Lynn Tillman, Dr. Ashley Jackson, and interview with the American painter Ivy Haldeman, Hilary Harkness: Everything for You presents a lifetime of paintings contextualized by evocative new dialogues and connections between the many experiences, influences and muses which drove Harkness’s creative expression. 

Black Dog Press
June 2024
224 pages