Jessica James Lansdon was born in Tucson Arizona in 1980. She experienced a privileged middle class upbringing spending her childhood riding horses and sailing in Mexico. Her mother works in public health; her father is a sculptor and a builder of fake rock. Jessica makes paintings, video, and sculpture out of a surfeit of discarded material goods and ideas. She is interested in the environmental and emotional perils of consumerism, the appeal of knick-knacks, new age philosophies, planned obsolescence, imperialism, and world's fairs.

Lets Trade Pictures (of words).In literature and advertising written words are emphasised (and de-emphasised) through the careful choice of fonts, sizing, and arrangement. Typographers use boldened fancy letters to give weight to titles and signage. Sometimes words get so heavy they are transformed into objects; objects which occupy space in our lives.

I am asking participants to make drawings of words to be put together in a poster. On the paper is a question to be answered using the participants best hand drawn letters, bubble letters, fancy script, block letters, whatever. These pictures are traded for a drawings I've made of flashy advertising type words. It is my hope to trade up for more genuine, specific kinds of words. The hand of the participants are put to work creating authenticity from the commercial.