Rachel Save Us Painting

I’ve been a professional artist for 25 years. In that time I’ve painted in oil, gouache and acrylic, on canvas, wood and cardboard boxes. I’ve dabbled in printmaking and encaustic and I’ve given blood (I do mean that literally), sweat and tears to the craft of embroidery. I’ve loved them all and never say never as to what I will do next. What I do know is that I wake up every morning with a need to create art. It is how I connect with the world and express who I am. My most recent work, started January 2021 is a form of pandemic diary. My life has become very small and given me an opportunity to think about the moments that make up a day. My dog barking, the houses we walk past, the knotty tree I didn’t notice yesterday. Painting these moments force me, and I hope the viewer, to “realize life while we live it” (to quote Thorton Wilder). The scenes are rendered not as they are, but as they appear in my mind with flattened shapes, distorted perspectives and romanticized palettes. While the work is primarily oil painting, I have pulled elements from past series to clarify my voice. This includes cardboard layers, outlined shapes and influences of outsider art to infuse the scenes with my humor, humanity and warped look at the world.