Shifted Perspectives, The Backstory
Shifted Perspective, is Informed by my design background and inspired by my obsession with mid-century interiors and architecture.
My painting style took a left turn in early 2020, after recovering from an unexpected medical circumstance the year prior. Read more about that here.
During those months after surgery I didn’t want to go back to any of the landscape or portrait paintings I had on my table. Believe me I tried. I joined online groups and classes to paint together. It just wasn’t coming back to me, that same passion.I think I only finished one. My body and brain seemed very hungry for randomness, mark making, color clashes, so I decided to indulge it. Very very tiny paintings at first, but they solidified my desire for more. I titled this the Beautiful Rebellion collection which eventually evolved into a small capsule of larger pieces.
About 9m later, after returning from a trip to Palm Springs, a new desire was emerging.
These solid intersecting planes of color, sliding this way and that, seemed to pour out of me. The rich and royal colors, the crisp lines, all signified my need for control. Although the path to this collection was totally unexpected, and sidelined Beautiful Rebellion, I found joy, peace and calm in these new abstracts. It felt like they were taking me out of the messy randomness and toward a more centered, structured and controlled existence.
This was also the very beginning months of the pandemic. I had moved permanently to Manzanita on the Oregon coast and the quiet and dark winter made me seek joy and color however I could get it. I was deep into chronic daily migraines with other odd symptoms, so these paintings were my light.
Intentionally minimalist, this collection required restraint and focus to not fill the entire canvas with paint, to work with the negative space. There is an unanticipated depth for me, an instinct, that continues to unfold with each and every shape and color choice. Tiny art requires boldness, and a point of view to stand on its own. I hope you, the viewer, and perhaps collector, finds just as much joy in them as I did creating them.
I now know painting for me is like therapy. Sometimes I just want answers, someone else to tell me what to do. But others, I’m all in for self-reflection and exploration. My collections come directly from how I’m feeling….about feeling. I hope that makes some sense.