Emmie Sherertz is a Southern-born artist whose work investigates the inherent tensions within identity, form, and perception. Raised in northwest Alabama, early experiences with traditional expressions of femininity shaped an evolving inquiry into the dualities that define women’s’ personal and cultural narratives.

Sherertz holds a BFA from Auburn University and an MA from the University of Alabama. Her practice explores the interplay between opposing forces—beauty and strangeness, complexity and calm, the corporeal and the ethereal. Through large-scale abstract installations, blind contour drawings, and other experimental formats, she seeks to express and reconcile these extremes, cultivating a visual balance within conceptual and formal tension.

When Emmie relocated to Northern California for her family’s military service, she was able to diversify her encounters with women of all ages and ethnicities. Continuing her interest in self-actualization and the body, she credits this time with a growth of ideas, expanding beyond the boundaries and limitations she found constricting while living in the South.

Military service again brought Emmie and her family back to the deep South, to Columbus, Mississippi. There, over twelve years, she developed close personal relationships with women in the community—connections that furthered her exploration of how internal narratives, bodily awareness, and self-perception intersect. Many of these women sat (and moved) for blind contour portraits, the basis of Emmie’s paintings that express the personality and spirit of the subject, beyond their physical bodies.

Now based outside of Atlanta, GA, Sherertz continues to examine the contradictions that shape the female experience. Her artwork invites viewers into spaces where ambiguity, disruption, and harmony co-exist—revealing identity as a dynamic negotiation between extremes.