Kate Gartrell Art Talk

Yesterday I attended the lecture that Prof. Gartrell gave discussing her work in recent years. On the flier that advertised the event there was an image shown that depicted the a pair of lower legs in cowboy boots. I was immediately drawn to this image because of its almost mischievous subject matter and the unusual composition that focused on purely the lower legs of the figure. The images shown in the lecture primarily focused on Gartrell's work produced in her recent years in graduate school at Brandies University. Among her work I particularly enjoyed seeing the large scale portraits of her friends. She described her process of working on them for several hours, and then at the end of her day doing a quick color study portrait. I thought that this was an interesting way of working that I had never experimented with my own work. I had always assumed that quick color studies were meant to be at the beginning of a painting session in order to warm up. Doing this at the end of a session had never occurred to me and reminded me of the fast sprint at the end of a race. I was also interested in Prof. Gartrell's artistic shift to focus on observational painting rather than to work from photographs. I think that this was interesting decision to make, and ultimately a positive one. I especially liked "Self Portrait in Pink Skirt." In that painting there is terrific brush work displayed in the forms created in the pink cloth of her skirt, which is juxtaposed nicely with figure's cowboy boots.