Debra Wuliger

I am a self-represented full time artist living in Durham, North Carolina. i paint the figure and portraits using both realistic and abstracted styles. To abstract the figure I create a densely patterned and textured canvas by building up the surface through many oil paint layers. When the pattern emerges with depth, texture and light I integrate the figure into the pattern using both line and painted shapes, working until the painting is a unified whole. In this way I hope to communicate how we are all made from the one substance and all interconnected into one whole.

The realistic paintings comes from my work as a community artist. I go into a community and collect stories and photographs of the people I meet. Using these reference materials, I create portraits that I exhibit back in the community, creating a way for the people to see themselves and each other more deeply. For these portraits I use the media that best expresses the place. I still build the figure with many layers of color.

I paint because I crave the rich color that the medium affords. It is a pleasure to work with a limited palette, a warm and cool red, yellow and blue along with white. It is amazing to me that with these seven hues I can mix any c...

The Cleveland Institute of Art, in Cleveland, Ohio, is where I did a year of intensive figure study using the live model. It is also where I met a mentor that advised me to learn by creating art continually and looking for help when I needed it. This is the path I has been on since, continually enriching my understanding of the world and art through self-study and a variety of workshops, classes and teachers.

"Coffee Talk" solo exhibition, Durham Arts Council, Durham, North Carolina; July 2014-December 2014
Raleigh Literary Review, Raleigh, North Carolina; three paintings from the "Coffee Talk" series published; February 2014
"From My Side of the Brain" solo exhibition, T-Gallery, Raleigh, North Carolina; June 2014
"The End is Over" group exhibition, Winmore Studio, Chapel Hill, North Carolina; July 2013 to December 2013