Artist's Statement:
As an artist, I like to trust the paint more than I trust my eyes. Realism isn’t always best to capture a place or a person. Even when I paint realistically, I try to find the moments of abstraction and go where the paint wants me to. Because it is paint, and I don’t want the viewer to forget it. Oil is a beautiful medium with a fluid, forgiving nature. It can be translucent and opaque. Dry and wet. Thin and thick. Rough and smooth. I am drawn to bold reds, rich blues, and subtle tones. It’s always a marvel when an awful canvas becomes a painting just because one more layer of paint made everything right. My subject matter is primarily figure art with some landscape and illustration, but when I paint, it’s about the paint.
Christine Welman - Milwaukee, Wisconsin 2022
