Pentimento
Pentimento
Karin Waskiewicz
on view through November 11, 2023
Karin Waskiewicz’s paintings unveil the information hidden within the complex color system. Inspired by a remembered landscape, Waskiewicz recreates memories of a space that became abstract over time. Memories in the artworks are decoded, exposing associated with a moment feelings and characteristics of a landscape.
Waskiewicz combines the visual and the emotional from the experience, translating it to layers of physical and affective elements. Waskiewicz’s unforgiving style of carving paint allows the viewer to see every layer, as well as each change and decision made by the artist throughout the painting process.
Waskiewicz’s artwork highlights visible layers of paint differing from the under paint. Each panel is thickly built up with many layers of multi-hued acrylic paint, sufficient to accumulate beyond the edges of the panel, creating organic form. Strokes in the dry paint are carved using tools traditionally meant for woodworking, uncovering the information, making the earlier elements of the painting visible. This unique practice evokes the flickering light and color of the natural world. Similar to creating a puzzle, the artist integrates carved chips in the layers of three-dimensional woven textures from other paintings, connecting her body of work not only conceptually but physically.
“Waskiewicz’s unforgiving style of carving paint allows the viewer to see every layer, as well as each change and decision made by the artist throughout the painting process.”
The paintings change slightly with the viewer’s gaze, inviting to walk around and explore the artwork from different angles. Like impressionism, Waskiewicz’s paintings offer micro vs macro approach, while each point of view exposes emergence of earlier layers, forms and carefully planned woven grids.
The artist discovers what is the underpaint of her artwork, much like that an archeologist, she excavates the surface of the painting to expose fragments of time. Waskiewicz compares the layers to moments in her own life; as some events stay with us, others remain faint and distant memories. The artist’s goal is not only to capture the way a specific landscape looks and feels, but how complex they affect our consciousness and resonate in different ways within our memories. All of that allows the viewer to become immersed in the process of painting.
Karin Waskiewicz about creating ‘Approaching Storm’ painting:
“Many different layers and embedded information is found in approaching storm. The first 10 layers has a straight carve all the way through with paint filled into the carved canals. This creates the affect of a woven textile. There is also a layered outline of a tree on opposite sides mimicking a curtain in the composition. Paint chips from past paintings are also imbedded within the layers to create a shared history within multiple paintings. The final result is a glowing landscape that is constantly changing as the viewer physically moves around it. Depending on the lighting and the time of day, the painting itself changes as different colors are caught by the light.”
“Waskiewicz compares the layers to moments in her own life; as some events stay with us, others remain faint and distant memories. The artist’s goal is not only to capture the way a specific landscape looks and feels, but how complex they affect our consciousness and resonate in different ways within our memories.”
Selected Artworks
“Day Break II”
Carved Acrylic on Panel
21 x 19 in
“Approaching Storm”
Acrylic on Panel
78 x 108 in
“Hydrangea in Bloom”
Acrylic on Panel
54 x 78 in
Learn more about the artists
we invite you to visit the gallery.
