Melissa Dickenson is a San Francisco–based artist whose work explores the intersection of material, memory, and place through abstract landscapes rooted in the natural world. Using pigments made from soil, sand, charcoal, and rock — often combined with synthetic hues — she creates layered compositions that evoke the quiet, dreamlike quality of memory. Her intuitive process of pouring, tilting, and wiping paint allows a landscape to emerge on the canvas as both a portrait of place and a tactile record of experience. While primarily working in painting, her practice also utilizes photography, drawing, sculpture, and site-specific research.
Dickenson holds a BFA from the Maryland Institute College of Art and an MFA from California College of the Arts. Her work has been exhibited extensively throughout San Francisco and nationally at venues including the Baltimore Museum of Art, the Wattis Institute for Contemporary Arts, and American University’s Katzen Gallery. International exhibitions include Youkobo Art Space in Tokyo and the Moscicki Center for Culture in Poland, and her work is held in the permanent collection of the Embassy of Sudan in Khartoum.
CA Coast During Wildfires of 2020
Lapis Ocean
from stone to paint
