Our interview with Toronto-based painter Mara Korkola took place by telephone and email over the course of two months. Mara Korkola's captivating works compress worlds of information into small intimate oil paintings. The sunset paintings featured here are based on photographs taken from hiking trips along the west coast of British Columbia. Late evening is Korkola's signature time of day. This is when she prefers to paint as [...]
Jeroen Witvliet spoke to me about his path to contemporary art making and the curiosity that continues to drive his work. Witvliet's art practice is a response to contemporary times; to be aware and to find a sense of the poetic while questioning current events, historical accuracy and memory. Tell us a bit about yourself. My country of birth [...]
Kyle Scheurmann spoke to me about his path to contemporary art making and the curiosity that continues to drive his work. Scheurmann’s art practice is contingent upon extensive travel, relying on experiential research of the earth’s diverse ecosystems. "I hope my most recent paintings are seen as a practice in documenting the ever-changing state of the earth...." Can you [...]
Randall Steeves' paintings celebrate the complexity of the natural world. The paintings are made from encaustic, a beeswax based paint that is heated and brushed onto the canvas where it hardens immediately. The process results in a complex surface that can be read as a chronology of the painting’s construction and a record the painter’s physical presence and actions. Viewing this work, one is reminded of John Cage’s famous dictum that [...]
BIOGRAPHY Late evening is Mara Korkola’s signature time of day. This is when she prefers to paint as it allows for uninterrupted sessions and working wet on wet, a technique that gives her paintings their lush and fluid surfaces. It is also her favourite time to photograph cities, when streets are devoid of human traffic and the lights emanating from buildings, headlights and street lamps appear jewel-like against the [...]
Elissa Cristall Gallery is pleased to present SHAPE FORM COLOUR LINE: the language of abstraction. The exhibition features Anda Kubis, Amanda Reeves, M.E. Sparks, Randall Steeves. The paintings in this group exhibition document the diverse approach to abstract painting. Formally concerned with shape, form, colour, and line, the artists execute their individual visions of abstraction on canvas, on paper and on panel. The works vary in scale, opacity, colour and spatiality; each distinctly [...]
Jessica Korderas creates three dimensional dioramas that she meticulously constructs through painting and drawing, which are then cast, layer upon layer, into a block of resin. The process is slow, time consuming, and unforgiving. Each work is carefully planned and considered. Korderas combines drawing with acrylic resin to create a relief effect. She constructs the backgrounds on illustration board. She creates the figures and paints each one on mylar. The figures and backgrounds [...]
