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Jacqueline Chisick is emerging as an important
artist of the Northwest. Her rich, luscious colors are always
recognizable, and her forms seem full of the very life around
her.
Born in Arizona, she was raised in the hill country of cowboys
and copper miners, with her family later moving to the desert;
the muted colors of Arizona figured prominently in her earlier
works.
She received her Master's degree from Arizona State University,
and apprenticed under several European-trained artists. After
teaching university and college art classes for twenty years,
she packed her paints, her cat and her levis into her 1977 Porsche
and moved to Port Townsend, Washington.
The human figure has always been important in her paintings,
but since moving to Port Townsend her colors have become more
intense and rich, with mysterious, deep crimsons and violets
contrasting with the light of gold and vermillion.
Artists' statement - For all painters, the conflicting
demands of past and present, of tradition and modernity, provide
an unending challenge. The great works of the past, whether
by Caravaggio or Ingres, van Gogh or Holbein, can be inhibiting
by their seemingly unattainable technical mastery and ideal
fusion of form and content.
On the other hand, the contemporary scene with its tempting
alternatives to painting can confuse and divert those lacking
in conviction. Although painters are no longer burdened by academic
theories and methods, we still must acquire and maintain the
difficult skills of drawing and painting as well as confront
and address problems pertinent to the art of our time, the most
important factor being the continued involvement with the traditional
skills of painting alongside the more contemporary uses of mixed
mediums and photo imagery.
Jacqueline remains passionately dedicated to drawing and painting
the human figure, and to the continuity and renewal of painterly
language. Often fractured by the rigors of daily life, it is
a constant refocusing of energy and time to continue to make
art, yet the art still gets finished. She revels in the process
of applying pencil to paper or paint to canvas.
According to Jacqueline, the joy of making a color work, or
depicting the nuance of a cast shadow, or changing an expression
with just a flick of the brush -- these are what bring the passion
alive, and creativity expands ten-fold when artists gather to
interact and debate and that is why we tend to gather in colonies
like Port Townsend, yet obstinately seek refuge in solitude.
Jacqueline has been asked
Why do you paint? The obvious and only answer is that I paint
because I must, and I choose to make art that is beautiful,
expressive and representational of all women, says Jacqueline.
As a matured artist Jacqueline chooses to turn her back on the
ugly, violent anti-art of the last half-century and to look
for the beautiful possibilities that art can be.
She wants her work to stir people and to create a lasting, meaningful,
emotional response. Jacqueline goes on to say although we painters
must constantly refer to the lessons of the old masters, we
still must acquire and maintain the difficult skills of drawing
and painting. I remain passionately dedicated to representing
the human figure and the plein aire landscape, and to the continuity
and renewal of painterly language.
It is a constant refocusing of energy and time to continue to
make art; yet the art still gets finished. Her main medium of
work right now is oil painting, along with its parallel medium
of acrylic. Jacqueline loves the tradition of oils and the smell.
She loves the fact that the linseed oil of the paint and the
linen of the canvas come from the same plant. She loves the
subtle differences in the 100 or more colors of reds that are
available.
Red is the color of all life. The very greens of field and forest
look better when underpainted with reds, either warm or cool
depending on the condition of the light and the time of day.
All my figure paintings begin with a laying in of red, says
Jacqueline.
A new painting begins usually by appearing in her mind, she
sees it there, ready for her to paint, almost as if she had
painted it in another life. It is just a matter of setting it
down on canvas, layer after layer, starting with rich, transparent
dark glazes and finishing with opaque lights. Jacqueline rarely
works from photos as she can never seem to get the living person
from a photograph.
She tries to focus herself to do a painting/drawing a day, and
finds that her skills of observation and rendering have increased
tremendously. Always working from life, plein aire, is a new
enthusiasm, and she finds herself more and more often dragging
her French easel around in its little cart, over hill and beach
and city streets to paint outdoors.
These landscapes do not seem to be very cheerful, just dark
and brooding, but that is what she sees, and she paints what
she sees. "I know a painting is finished when there is nothing
left to do," says Jacqueline. |
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914
water street, port townsend, washington 98368 | telephone (360) 385-3630