Gail Siptak and Sarah Thompson: Enchanted Garden & Friends

April 01 - May 01,2023

From Koelsch Gallery: "koelsch gallery is pleased to announce our newest exhibition, Enchanted Garden & Friends, featuring an array of both early and late works by artists Gail Siptak and Sarah Thompson. Join us for the opening reception taking place on Saturday, April 1st from 5:00 - 8:00 pm. Through the old and honorable tradition of narration, Gail Siptak conjures stories of life overseen and overheard through her whimsical gouache-layered paintings. In her ninth exhibition with koelsch gallery, Siptak continues to convert life experiences of the self and natural world into a whimsical visual narrative. As a child, Siptak aspired to become a professional entomologist. Growing up in San Fransisco and Palo Alto, California, in the 1960s and 70s, Siptak was surrounded by a multitude of water and terrain. It was here that she explored the grandeur of the natural world and found her church in its actuality. Since 1964, Siptak has been painting the world around her and the experiences that come with it. During the pandemic, Siptak veered away from oil paintings and took on the restorative process of gouache paint. With the combination of handmade paper and gouache, Siptak is able to densely layer her opaque, chalky paint, and closely imitate "body color" or "egg tempura". Before the invention of oil paint, body color was among the most common painting mediums during the Middles Ages and consisted of pigments and egg yolk for the purpose of illuminating manuscripts. With gouache, Siptak creates rich, flat patterns and dense strokes of colors that possess a strong visual summoning. With her work, Siptak creates a clear channel between the observer and the observed. "I paint what I see of the human condition - be it animal or object. The glimmer of humor, pathos, and spirit in so much of what I see is the basis of what I paint." In her first-ever showcase with koelsch gallery, Sarah Thompson will be exhibiting an assortment of old and new works composed of medium-to-large acrylic on canvas and wood paintings, along with small watercolor abstractions. At the mere age of ten, Sarah Thompson embarked on her artistic journey after discovering the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. Being raised in a household isolated from arts and culture, Thompson was discouraged by her family to take on the path of artistry and found herself single-handed in its pursuit. "Art is my safe space, where I am alone and free to be me." By 1980, Thompson transmuted into a symbolist with personal iconography and dream-like structure. Thompson's figurative paintings encompass recurring elements that retain a strong reference to the real world. From floral and human forms to landscape and still life, her subjects derive from her natural surroundings of the Cascade Mountains of Washington State and attribute to her genesis of creative outpour. However sensible these elements may be, Thompson's compositions come to life through an artistic process driven by memory, dreams, and imagination. Similar to other visionary artists, Thompson is largely guided by intuition and practices "automatic painting", or "automatism". Often described as an "expression of the subconscious", automatic painting is a method of the creative process that aims to suppress the thinking mind in an effort to allow the subconscious to fully take over. At the turn of her surrender, Thompson creates a strong harmony of color and value that is nourished by a powerful pulse beating between darkness and light."  

Reception: April 01, 2023 | 5-8 pm

koelsch gallery 1020 Peden Street
Houston, TX 77006
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