Beschreibung:

Josette Urso OooLaLa 2 Watercolour on Paper Signed on Verso 10 x 15cm (3¾ x 5¾ in.) About Teetering between urban and natural subjects I make exploratory paintings and drawings working directly and urgently in response to my immediate environment. My approach involves "moment-to-moment" extrapolation governed by intuitive leaps of scale, color and wayward geometry. Contrasts and cross-fertilizations unfold and are cumulative, non-linear, free flowing and interpretive. Space becomes an ambiguous and malleable substance and I delight in its manipulation as I meander acrobatically in a kind of gymnasium of convoluted mark making and image collision. All along the way, I engage the known as well as the unknown in unforeseen ways. For me, drawing and painting parallel the act of seeing and are the most direct links to private time with the physical world. Despite the urgency of my process, as I work, time still slows down. My work becomes a record of this exploration and a reflection of my inherent energy and reason for living. Education MFA/ Painting, University of South Florida, Tampa, FL Select Exhibitions/Awards Recipient of awards including an Adolph & Esther Gottlieb Foundation grant, two Pollock-Krasner Foundation grants, a Mid-Atlantic NEA, the Basil H. Alkazzi Award and a Ruth and Harold Chenven Foundation Award. Residencies include Ucross (2014 and 1995); Yaddo; Stock 20, Taiwan; AIEP American Artist's Abroad, Cambodia; Ballinglen Arts Foundation, Ireland; Camargo Foundation, France; Millay and the VCCA. Her work has been shown widely in the United States and abroad in galleries, public institutions, and museums including the New York Public Library, the Drawing Center, the Bronx Museum of the Arts, Markel Fine Arts and Kenise Barnes Fine Art. Gallery Representation Markel Fine Arts, New York, NY Kenise Barnes Fine Art, Kent, CT Statement about AOAP Submitted Artwork In my studio, the outside literally comes in through large windows that look across Brooklyn's lower lying factory buildings toward the tall grandness of Manhattan. This view merges with a studio interior filled with playful arrangements from my nature and hand-made object collections: rocks, plants, pinecones, metal and velvet flocked figurines as well as chenille and wire constructions that I often hang in the windows, bringing attention to the spaces between the inside and the outside. In these small works on paper, from my "OooLaLa" series, as in all of my paintings, I engage in the moment with deep curiosity and awe of my surroundings.