Tess Barbato

I use art as a means of communication about certain current social topics which have caught my attention. The medium of oils allows me to create dimension and suppleness that depicts an almost palpable rendering of the subject. This medium allows me to depict ordinary, often overlooked items in a distinctly tactile way.The common thread in all of my pieces is that they engender a conversation with the viewer about relationships. The work evokes to the obvious, if sometime unconscious, relationships that we have with objects we encounter every day. Aesthetically there is the purely visual relationship of the objects in a space, and to one another. My compositions transform those mundane objects into subjects which demand attention while engaging the viewer in the discourse that I wish to provoke. Ultimately, I would like to spark a dialog between my work and the viewer, who hopefully will appreciate the stylistic and technical choices that I have made.