What a nice surprise, coming back from Normandy, to see my painting on the cover of the latest issue of the "Nouvelles de l'Inde". This magazine is published by the Indian embassy in France, and although I knew they were planning an article, I did not expect my work to be on the cover.
Here is the article:
Most of the information in the French article were derived from this text in English which I wrote myself:
Why would an American artist from Chicago, residing in Paris, choose India as a theme for her paintings? A lifelong interest in other cultures than my own eventually led me to this choice.
In the mid 1970's, many American artists were tired of being isolated in their studios and wanted to recreate a role for artists which would allow them to participate in the lives of their local communities. The Public Art Workshop of Chicago was a group of urban artists who painted murals in cooperation with the local inhabitants, so when I received my first commission for a mural painting I contacted them for mentoring. This was the beginning of a lifelong career in public art. With each succeeding commission, my job was to synthesize the preoccupations of a particular group (ethnic, professional, etc.) into a work of art which would then be placed in a specific public site. This meant that I spent a lot of time observing and listening to others and putting their ideas into visual form. Through these experiences I realized that an artist can have a useful and meaningful role of sharing aspects of a designated culture with others.
In France, and in Reunion Island, I continued painting murals. I painted village life there, and eventually felt a need to paint about the island once back in my studio in Paris. I created a series of paintings which were exhibited, over a nine month period, in the main hall of the museum of Mankind in Paris when it was at the Place Trocadero. The museum published a catalog which contained photos of people and objects, a brief history of the island, and my paintings.
My interest in meditation and consciousness studies as well as art history and general culture, motivated me to go to India. For a person who loves to paint people, India offers an infinite source of inspiration. Traveling around the country, the colors, the textiles, the elegance of the women in their saris, the temples, the landscapes and citiscapes - all these stimulated the painter in me, proposing a multitude of exciting visual possibilities. India's art history is rich in iconography and provides a vast vocabulary of stunning visual imagery.
I decided to make India the theme of my paintings upon my return from my first trip to India, in the mid 90's, and continue to paint India exclusively today.
Style:
My way of composing pictures was strongly influenced by the Mexican and American mural movement. In these schools of painting (see Diego Rivera, Thomas Hart Benton), many different images are combined, creating a collage effect. By combining imagery: a landscape, a figure, a close-up of an object, all can co-exist and collectively tell a story. A narrative of this type would be closer to poetry than prose, if we search for a literary analogy. In other words, the viewer has some leeway to make up his own tale from the elements presented. The difficulty of this type of composition is managing to create a coherent image from components that do not visually co-exist in the real world. The eye should be able to travel around the canvas smoothly, and not be shocked or halted by the transition from one segment to the next.
Aesthetics really matter to me, and beauty is a goal. In each painting I am preoccupied by color harmony, fluidity of composition and execution, as well as technically good drawing. Everything and its opposite can be found in this world; I have chosen to concentrate on a positive vision.
I have adopted subject matter that reminds us we are fortunate to be human. When people look at one of my paintings, my goal is to bring them an instant's respite from our difficult world. I believe it was the American author John Barth who said that we could judge our own behavior by asking ourselves whether we were adding to or subtracting from the general misery. Every day, every moment, we are bombarded by negative and frightening information concerning our society and environment. I try to create compositions that encourage hope and reveal the innate elegance of humanity. Hopefully I am bringing some solace and joy to those who take the time to look at my paintings. This point of view was magnificently demonstrated by the artists of the Renaissance (a time when misery also prevailed) and more recently, Gustav Klimt, who greatly enjoyed painting women and children in an exuberant, joyful and luxuriant fashion.
Technique:
I had my art training in the United States at Southern Illinois University, then at the Ecole des Beaux Arts in Paris. During my years in art school at Southern Illinois University, I was lucky to find a teacher, Mr. Patrick Betaudier, who had mastered Renaissance oil painting technique and taught me his painting methods. I didn't realize until much later in life just how rare excellent teachers are and am very grateful to have benefitted from his guidance.
Technically speaking, my works are executed in a classical oil painting method. This means that I work in oil glazes, using thin layers of color over an underpainting. The underpainting is sketched in, then the forms of the picture are enhanced with white. Between each glaze, white is once again scumbled (scumbling is brushing a layer of white over a darker tone), and when dry, a glaze is applied to reinforce the color. So to get strong color, many layers of glaze and scumbled white are required. To assure longevity, I use not only an oil medium, but also a glue emulsion which I make myself. I am always generous with the number of glazes, keeping in mind that oil paint becomes transparent with age. Paintings of this type take weeks and months to complete; in a normal year, I can make four paintings.
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My website: www.kathleenscarboro.fr