HABOOB Painting

Mary Bruns I am an artist using split imagery as a means of expression. The activity of one side of the painting or drawing is filled with the thoughts, activities and memories which best describe the separate and solo image whose full image is juxtaposed next to it. I call my painting “collective realism” as it is a chief means of visual energy to satisfy and explain a situation, a life, an encounter or human dilemma, the same way a theater visit gives explanations and insights. I refer to old photographs, photos I have taken, real life botanicals and ads as references and models in my paintings. I give vintage photos a story and stage and enjoy the process of painting or drawing each one to look like a photograph or the exacting of an ad. These are not transferred images. They are still life props displayed and then painted in oil on linen. I never use transfers, only a hand painted glaze technique. I use a glaze over glaze technique as the old Masters did. At no time are transfers ever used. A current exhibit deals with storytelling enhanced by the historical meaning of flowers. Down through the ages flowers have substituted as a metaphor for feelings, passions, love, hatred, anger and innocence. Place yourself within the still life paintings and see what image you would have put on the adjacent side. My choices of flowers blended the feelings and ideology that I attached to each still life. The images of the photos help to tell a story, while the flower expounds upon it. I also use images of the past as references to who we are. Some people call it nostalgia, but it really is a reflection back on us as if we are a documentary in time. Ordinary objects become quite extraordinary if taken the time to look at them. BIO MARY BRUNS I was born in 1950 in a small farming community of Brunsville, Iowa. My great grandmother owned the land that the railroad purchased and they named the town of 142 after her. I went to a country school that flourished until I was in the 7th grade. I had one person besides myself in the class. Those heart warming days made for the beginnings in art. Classes were filled with board decorating and room warmth. It all interested me so much that my grandparents bought me a painting kit, which I enthusiastically completed and have to this day. That was when I was eight. Life in this remote rural setting meant that one had to find one’s own means of entertainment.