ARTIST STATEMENT

 

JEANNIE DOUGLAS ART was founded in 2004, when I picked up a paintbrush for the first time and started to paint with passion, color, curiosity and wonder, even though I had no formal art training. I knew at that moment, that painting was my calling. For the next 15 years, I was an avid Watercolorist and student of realism. I am now a professional Artist working solely in Acrylics with a vibrant, bold, wild, expressive style. I call myself an Abstract Expressionist. I work from intuition and emotion creating expressive and colorful paintings of landscapes and flower fields that honor my love of nature, through canvas and paint. There is a fine line for me, between the control of realism and the freedom, playfulness and unpredictability I feel, when painting abstracted art. I paint to express my emotional response to the beauty and power of nature's energy and spontaneity.

 I am a San Francisco Bay Area Acrylic Artist, spending my days painting in my studio in the Sonoma Valley, where art, wine, food and nature provide a passport to happiness. As an artist, I am grateful to be surrounded by the magnificent and diverse landscape of Northern California that provides an endless source of creative inspiration for me. My paintings are a direct reflection of the world of color and joy that I hope we can all live in, inspiring us to live a colorful, artful and joyful life.

I am at my happiest, when I'm outdoors, listening to my heart sing or painting the landscape in my studio! Every moment I'm not in nature, I'm thinking about it. This is what keeps me coming back to my studio day after day.

Nature is unpredictable, fleeting and ever-changing. My ambition is to capture the moment with photography, paint and canvas, before the memory fades. Through my artwork, I aim to bring the outside in, to enjoy at all times.  As you can see, nature is my biggest lure, muse and passion, behind every painting I create.

The images that form my work are inspired from my adventures and exploration in the great outdoors. I then go back to my studio, look past the obvious and close my eyes to remember the feeling I had when I was at that location. I paint from a picture created by my memory, feelings and imagination, connecting me to that place in nature. I’m not distracted by the details; rather I embellish the feeling I have with rich colors, translucent layers, depth, and impasto texture, while blending in both realism and expressionism that brings an experience to life.

My aim is to tell a story of the landscape that bursts onto the canvas with color, emotion, texture and movement. When I paint, I can feel the flowers swaying in the wind, smell their fragrance, see the shadows and light streaming across the trail, hear the waves crashing on the rugged rocks and can reach out and touch the scarlet sunset.

I work mostly in Acrylics, using Golden and Liquitex paints, gels and mediums because of their professional quality, heavy pigment, color strength, creamy consistency and coverage. I am a very square and flat person! I use mostly square canvases, starting with 12 x 12, up to 36 x 36, although I do venture into other sizes at times. I prefer flat, square and angled brushes to round brushes and I also love the effect I can get by using palette knives and spatulas.  

My process is to start applying color and markings onto the blank canvas without any rhyme or reason. At this point, I'm just having fun, getting loose and painting with wild abandon and color. The underpainting is done with drips and larger brushstrokes of color, colored, using big paintbrushes, spatulas, and palette knives. I then apply layer upon layer of color, with lots of texture, gels and glazes to add translucency and reveal the unexpected from each layer. Acrylic paint is the perfect medium for me ,because it is fast drying and allows me to paint with lots of layers, in a short amount of time. I also drip, dot, scratch, and then hone in on the details of the flowers or the landscape with smaller brushes, more refined brushstrokes and texture, when I am in the last stages of the painting.  

I started down my creative path later in life, with a passion for art and color and it has now blossomed into my artist career today. Creating art has taught me to never give up on my dreams. It has taught me to slow down, savor the details and to live a life in full color.  For me, being an artist, has unlocked doors of courage and confidence, allowing me to follow my dreams and to have a job I love to do...PAINT!

The true wonder and magical beauty of the landscape is an inspiration to me everyday. My hope is that my artwork evokes a feeling of joy and inspiration for you.  As you immerse yourself into one of my paintings and feel an emotional connection of your own, then I have accomplished my goal.