MARGARET LAZZARI: VASTNESS
June 20 - July 25, 2020
View Exhibition:
•NEW• VIEWING ROOM
ARTSY
ARTIST STATEMENT
These paintings are about the space around us, which metaphorically references the space within us. Both spaces are vast and at the same time transitory and ever-changing. These “landscapes” are energy, space, light and matter. They are about us as humans in the physical world, the marvel of existence, and also the unknown or mysterious aspect of the world around us.
The paintings are based on patterns found in landforms, water, and sky. I am trying to make paint seem to be air and light, to suggest what physicists tell us: that matter can transform into light and energy. I want the paintings to convey the density of matter, the luminosity of voids, and movement or vibration. The paintings suggest vastness. Many have a very low or very high horizon line, so that either the sky or the ground seems to expand outward for great distances. The resulting spaces seem large and light filled, but also unstable, changing, and dynamic.
Water is a big inspiration for these paintings. It has no intrinsic shape. As liquid it fills the oceans but as vapor it fills the sky. But it has weight and can exert tremendous force. Its movement creates rhythms and patterns that are beautiful. Sky and ocean can be any color and sometimes look like each other. Skies may be green, yellow, or blue. And then within each color, I try to find random specks of other hues, like what happens when water breaks down light into rainbow colors.
While my paintings are not literal landscapes, they are influenced by historical landscape art, especially those expressing transcendence, like Ansel Adams photographs, paintings from the Hudson River school, or the American luminist painters of the late 1800s. All suggest landscape paintings do more than just record surface features; they are studies of the structure of the physical world and evocative of human emotions.
The paintings are based on patterns found in landforms, water, and sky. I am trying to make paint seem to be air and light, to suggest what physicists tell us: that matter can transform into light and energy. I want the paintings to convey the density of matter, the luminosity of voids, and movement or vibration. The paintings suggest vastness. Many have a very low or very high horizon line, so that either the sky or the ground seems to expand outward for great distances. The resulting spaces seem large and light filled, but also unstable, changing, and dynamic.
Water is a big inspiration for these paintings. It has no intrinsic shape. As liquid it fills the oceans but as vapor it fills the sky. But it has weight and can exert tremendous force. Its movement creates rhythms and patterns that are beautiful. Sky and ocean can be any color and sometimes look like each other. Skies may be green, yellow, or blue. And then within each color, I try to find random specks of other hues, like what happens when water breaks down light into rainbow colors.
While my paintings are not literal landscapes, they are influenced by historical landscape art, especially those expressing transcendence, like Ansel Adams photographs, paintings from the Hudson River school, or the American luminist painters of the late 1800s. All suggest landscape paintings do more than just record surface features; they are studies of the structure of the physical world and evocative of human emotions.
