Alethea Maguire
Paintings, Drawings, Sculpture
Spire, Watercolor, 8.5 x 8.5'', '11
T E M P E S T
The 1967 Britannica World Atlas was my haven. On its pages: ships flung open sails and pirates pinpointed islands yet to be discovered (every destination: a map to be redrafted… reconfigured). With gratitude, my parents, who read to me as a kid (with their love of literature/days teaching/nights in the art studio) lit my imagination on fire.
As soon as possible, traversing the wild expanse from sierra to sea-bound-abyss, became a hunt for rugged terrain, well worth the risk, as were the reflective studio years that followed (reading, painting and college teaching in states such as: Delaware, Wyoming, Michigan,
New Jersey and New York).
From the Catskills and Hudson River Valley, equally inspiring jaunts abroad to draft and paint in the Netherlands, Greece… Ireland (in ink, watercolor… oil), held the same magnetism: that singularity of orientation where vanishing points, patterns of tread, and the horizon line: fold and collapse into mud, ooze and mist.
These are still the intrinsic, textural rhythms that I work to apprehend. Anamorphic shapes such as the trapezoid create for me an opportunity to further protract vast distances (wanting to push perceptual depth as far back as I can), in my paintings. Capturing the terrestrial expanse continues to be my favorite affliction.
This family tradition of being a fine artist, educator and rambler revolves around our storytelling rituals of intrepid expeditions (also incorporating those of my husband). In our own way, we each idiosyncratically decipher the experience of what I like to call: ‘placehood’ (the ability of nature to create, mend and reshape its integral identity).
For me, open roads are the most exciting to travel when big skies are free to misbehave under healthy conditions. Reversing the effects of global warming, it will be exciting to contribute to the next planetary conservationist movement. Recently, for example, my undergraduate students (at Berkeley College) designed ‘Overfishing Infographics.’
Also, who knew that frozen methane (trapped in tundra/under massive glaciers), once heated, more than any other green-house-gas, could speed global warming past the tipping point? As a landscape painter I much prefer ‘remote’ to ‘desolate.’ Clearly my cause is to celebrate life: our shared wilderness (and to honor its delicate vitality).
*Sharing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J_wDIcSDPPk + https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=21D3ByfPTx8
My opinion of ‘Mother Nature’ is that she is playfully disobedient because she is problem solving. Protecting our global species, forests, oceans… our interdependent eco-systems, while sustaining wind, water, solar… renewable energy, that will be our next art form. If the Earth is radically reclaiming her soil, her latest masterpiece will be our co-creation.
Alethea Maguire
[email protected]
The 1967 Britannica World Atlas was my haven. On its pages: ships flung open sails and pirates pinpointed islands yet to be discovered (every destination: a map to be redrafted… reconfigured). With gratitude, my parents, who read to me as a kid (with their love of literature/days teaching/nights in the art studio) lit my imagination on fire.
As soon as possible, traversing the wild expanse from sierra to sea-bound-abyss, became a hunt for rugged terrain, well worth the risk, as were the reflective studio years that followed (reading, painting and college teaching in states such as: Delaware, Wyoming, Michigan,
New Jersey and New York).
From the Catskills and Hudson River Valley, equally inspiring jaunts abroad to draft and paint in the Netherlands, Greece… Ireland (in ink, watercolor… oil), held the same magnetism: that singularity of orientation where vanishing points, patterns of tread, and the horizon line: fold and collapse into mud, ooze and mist.
These are still the intrinsic, textural rhythms that I work to apprehend. Anamorphic shapes such as the trapezoid create for me an opportunity to further protract vast distances (wanting to push perceptual depth as far back as I can), in my paintings. Capturing the terrestrial expanse continues to be my favorite affliction.
This family tradition of being a fine artist, educator and rambler revolves around our storytelling rituals of intrepid expeditions (also incorporating those of my husband). In our own way, we each idiosyncratically decipher the experience of what I like to call: ‘placehood’ (the ability of nature to create, mend and reshape its integral identity).
For me, open roads are the most exciting to travel when big skies are free to misbehave under healthy conditions. Reversing the effects of global warming, it will be exciting to contribute to the next planetary conservationist movement. Recently, for example, my undergraduate students (at Berkeley College) designed ‘Overfishing Infographics.’
Also, who knew that frozen methane (trapped in tundra/under massive glaciers), once heated, more than any other green-house-gas, could speed global warming past the tipping point? As a landscape painter I much prefer ‘remote’ to ‘desolate.’ Clearly my cause is to celebrate life: our shared wilderness (and to honor its delicate vitality).
*Sharing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J_wDIcSDPPk + https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=21D3ByfPTx8
My opinion of ‘Mother Nature’ is that she is playfully disobedient because she is problem solving. Protecting our global species, forests, oceans… our interdependent eco-systems, while sustaining wind, water, solar… renewable energy, that will be our next art form. If the Earth is radically reclaiming her soil, her latest masterpiece will be our co-creation.
Alethea Maguire
[email protected]
Hypnotism, Watercolor, 5.75 x 18
Circulation, Watercolor, 12x6
Immersion, Watercolor, 7.5 x 18
Endurance, Watercolor, 8.5 x 8.5
Big Sky, Oi on Paper/Panel, 6x6
Shandaken, Watercolor, 11x11'', '06
Texel, Oil on Rice Paper/Panel, 6x6
Night Walk, Watercolor, 20x14'', '06 SOLD
Haven, Watercolor, 8.5x8.5'', '11
Colossus, Watercolor, 14 x 20'', '06
Fourni, Watercolor, 8.5 x 8.5
Fire, Oil on Panel, 6x6
Wetland, Oil on Panel, 6x12
Magnetism, Charcoal, 15.25 x 23'', '12
Birch Trees, Ink Sketch, 10x14'', '05 NFS
Scheveningen, Oil on Rice Paper/Panel, 6 x 6
Globe, Burnt Antiquated Softball/Leather, Graphite & Steel, 10x8'', '08