Tuesday, April 6, 2010

Delivering Artwork to a Gallery

This week I am delivering "White" to the Autobody Fine Art Gallery.

Inspiration for artists comes from all places, and the painting "White" is no exclusion. I had started this painting while I was going through a period of down time, or uninspired images. I had not drawn in my sketchbook for months. I forced myself to just keep painting and printmaking. For subject matter, I choose the iconographic skyline of San Francisco. So,....I just started painting, like any old easel painter would, with no direction, no message, or intent. I simply painted the SF skyline as everyone sees it on every sunny day. The painting sat half finished in my studio for months because I was unable to work on something so unattractive. To use the metaphor, "a lightbulb went off in my head," was kind of an understatement. I travel throughout the bay area and remembered the special moments when fog changes the natural landscape into a beautiful and expressively quiet place. These moments when the landscape changes from its regular, sunny, eye catching view was what stuck with me the most and gave me inspiration. It was only natural that I should choose to paint a landscape in various shades of white and grey. It was like a mathmetician working out a solution to a hard equation. The result was a long process of mixing various shades of white tinted by blues, greens, reds, yellows,..etc. to differentiate the sky, land, and water. Through trial and error, and multiple layers of paint, I managed to complete the picture. The alternating shades of white replicate the dead quiet beauty and calm feeling of cold and fog. This simple process of getting back to what I view as beautiful, even amongst the most mundane of subject matter, transformed this small piece from totally uninspired to actively working on an idea.



From here, I was propelled to continue with additional landscapes in larger sizes, with other "times of the day" that I found moving as inspiration. I finished "Oakland at Night" and 2 more landscape dyptichs of the SF Bay. I was able to remain inspired by changing the atmospheric conditions and using a very specific, toned down, color pallette. "San Francisco, Dusk" was created in blues, pinks, and purples to express a cool dusk evening, and "San Francisco, Warm Evening" was painted in yellows, reds, oranges, and browns to express a hot day coming to an end.

These tonalist pieces with a very limited color palette propelled me to complete more works and continue my focus on various images of night, and day.

Future/Tense, starting Friday, April 9th, and with the opening reception on Thursday, April 22, 2010 (Earth Day) / 5-10 p.m.

Artists include:
Gary Comoglio
Joanne Fullager (photograhy)
Mark Garrett (video installation)
Susan Lee Hackett (photography and quilting)
Linda Hanson (photography)
Sandra Hart (photography)
Jon Kerpel (sculpture)
Laleh Zahedi Latini (photography)

Aurora Mahassine (Transform 2012)
Rosie Powell (watercolor)
Christian Schiess (sculpture)
Mark Schroeder (photography)
Sunshine Urbaniak (photography)


Autobody Fine Art is proud to announce it’s first juried show, celebrating the ecology and geographic diversity of Alameda island and opening in conjunction with Earth Day. As many of you know (but just to be certain, I checked in with Wikipedia!) the island that Alameda occupies was originally a peninsula connected to Oakland. Much of the peninsula was low-lying and marshy, but on higher ground the peninsula and adjacent parts of what is now downtown Oakland were home to one of the largest coastal oak forests in the world. The area was therefore called "Encinal," Spanish for "oak grove." "Alameda" is Spanish for "grove of poplar trees" or "tree-lined avenue," and was chosen in 1853 by popular vote.

Five species on the endangered wildlife list make their home on Alameda Island, alongside a wide variety of waterfowl, plant life, domesticated animals and landscaped gardening, as well as over 75 thousand human beings. Artists have a responsibility to reflect social and environmental issues, be it through commentary, critique or celebration, and we are inviting you to become a part of the visual record of the island by taking part in our honoring of Earth Day.

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