I Am Here Painting

http://joanngilles.net/JoAnnGilles/Home.html Artist’s Statement My aim is to capture how a sense of place can ignite, inspire, soothe, and restore. How its recall reminds us of where we’ve been, what we’ve seen, who we’ve loved and who we are. Paintings begin with experience, photos, stories or a model. Many paintings in this body of work originated with a wonderful artist’s model named Autumn. She not only offers the figure as landscape, her presence in the studio provides an energy exchange that is catalyst to what become rocks and sea , rolling hills, waterfalls or stormy skies. Without full awareness, my painting style seems to shift to suit the subject--glazed skies, knife edged crags, impasto gnarled bark, etc. Medium is mostly acrylic. But anything that is compatible may be employed including: inks, charcoal, raw pigment, straw, sand. I’ve even worked with my mother’s ashes. (Those paintings are kept for family.)