Few artists find it easy to articulate what they do when they paint because they express themselves best in the medium they use and the process is always a bit mysterious because it is so intuitive.

 

When I paint I think in terms of colors: how colors react to each other, what makes another recede.  A speak of color can alter the entire structure of a painting.  How I apply a color matters vastly.  Smooth or rough, it all depends on the requirement of a particular passage.  There is so much going on that all I can do is to remain intensely focused in order to orchestrate all possibilities into a cohesive painting.

 

My abstract work has evolved from the traditional landscape. And still life.  I loved to paint from direct observation with an awareness that in the passing of time the light shifted, the shadows moved and things looked different from moment to moment.

 

Painting and observing have made me understand that the world in which we move is less solid than it seems.  It is not anchored.  It floats freely.  In a way I create it as I go.  When I go for a walk I think that I am walking through a familiar landscape.  But in fact each sensation, each tree observed, each scent noticed, each perception of warmth or of cold becomes a bit of memory instantly, a vast store from which I can recreate my image later.

 

When I paint I may start with some intuitive washes and marks until my mind is warmed up.  Sometimes I begin with ideas prompted by chance events: a thread pattern in the canvas, a brushstroke in the gesso or the outline of a color that feels familiar.  Then I respond to the images as they develop.  My criterion for authenticity is how engaged I feel in this crucial game.  The discipline is to remain intensely aware of. The process at all times.

 

In short my paintings are about construction from bits of visual memory.  My work is still about the landscape of a personal kind.

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-Marie Lousie Rouff