I Got a Mention!!!!

Ok, folks, so this is pretty cool! Trendcetera evidently visited the Affordable Art Fair and mentioned a few artists, including MOI! Not sure I would define my palette as psychedelic, but whatever. I'll take it, along with the suggestion that "one can't help but imagine this popping off the wall of a stark white loft flush with light."

Flattery!

And much better than a good batch of paintings on display is this. And then this. Go see. Since I don't teach I am exceedingly glad to at least be represented in a classroom.

The Essay

This is an essay about me written by Peter McLaughlin. Peter interviewed me by phone, and later he told me that he was glad I didn't do "artspeak". I said I was just a plain old regular girl from the midwest and never did quite figure out how to talk like that.


Tracy Helgeson

If you saw a Tracy Helgeson painting in a window in San Francisco, or Fort Worth or Chicago… you’d know immediately who painted it. Her vibrant pink barns and fuscia colored trees leap to the eye and stick to the mind like images from a pleasant dream … the kind you can’t forget even after you wake up.

Helgeson’s landscapes – inspired by the old barns and farm lands around her home near Cooperstown, New York – are original, distinctive and surely unconventional. Where others see green trees and weathered barns, she sees them as magenta, purple, orange or even blue. But in her hands – despite the unorthodox treatment – the colors seem perfectly plausible.

When Helgeson moved to upstate New York in 2003 with her husband and four children, she was deeply affected by the beauty of the area and decided to start painting nature for the first time in her life. “Until four years ago,” she says, “I had never painted a landscape.” Helgeson admits that before moving to the little village of Fly Creek she was thoroughly a city girl who had lived and studied in Minneapolis and Philadelphia and whose forte was figure drawing. “Not having any preconceived notions of what a landscape painting should be gave me great freedom to explore and experiment. At first I just wanted to paint simple trees and horizons and skies. But then I started to notice and include the structures I saw on the local farms. I became intrigued by barns. With their strong sturdy shapes and dramatic angles they became focal points for many of my paintings. Barns served the purpose of hinting at human presence in a landscape without having to show humans.”
“When I started painting landscapes, ” says Helgeson, “ I thought the traditional paintings of that genre were rather dark and moody -- for me anyway -- and I felt a strong urge to break out of the conventional landscape tradition by using brighter, livelier colors. So I started experimenting with colors not usually seen in landscapes.”

Although they’re done in an abstracted fashion, all of Helgeson’s paintings are of real places. They may or may not be recognizable, though, because she freely changes what she sees… eliminating doors and windows from barns, putting in tree lines where they didn’t exist and, of course, changing colors. Helgeson calls her paintings a combination of observation and imagination. “In each painting I struggle to leave out details. I fight to keep my paintings simple, which goes against my natural instinct to be representational. That’s why I paint from memory or photographs and not from life. If I’m looking directly at the subject while I work I’m tempted to include too much detail. I often have to remind myself that I paint to express myself, not to depict something.”

Helgson’s paintings achieve their visual glow through a process that starts with an underpainting. “I put a big old glob of oil paint on a wood panel. (I won’t reveal the secret color but it’s of an orangish nature). Then I coat the entire panel with the paint using a cotton rag. It’s messy. I use my fingers and cotton rags to do a basic drawing, using my fingernails to scratch in the sharper lines on, say, the roof of a barn or the edge of a road. At this point I have created a full and recognizable image (it’s called a reductive drawing) that I let dry for several days. Then I apply the colors, by brush, in thin layers of transparent and opaque glazes that allow the image and the texture of the underpainting to show through.” Large areas of pure color define the simplified forms of structure, land and trees. However, closer inspection reveals many subtleties and variations within the color field. Pink is never just pink, green is never just green. Fiery orange and reds may be undercurrents, while deep blues and greens are subtle overtones.

“ I get a visceral thrill from the process of doing the painting. I delight in the texture of the surfaces, the smell of the paint, the softness of the brushes, the color of the underpainting and the process of applying each layer of color. This makes every painting a sensory pleasure for me and – I hope – for whoever else sees it.”

Despite her success with landscape painting, Helgeson would still like to add to her repertoire and do more figure drawing, the skill she developed at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design and the Philadelphia College of Art (now the University of the Arts). “While in school we drew the unclothed figure nearly every day and I became quite good at it.” To that end, Helgeson has accepted the offer to do a month-long residency in February at the Vermont Studio Center in Johnson, Vermont. As artist-in-residence she’ll be free to pursue any art form she likes. “I’ve decided to do figure painting with the same technique I now uses on my landscapes. This will be a huge challenge because as an illustrator I did the figure in a conventional way. Now I’ll have to do it in a totally different style. The results should be very interesting.”
- Peter McLaughlin

Delivery To Williamstown

Today, Doug and I are driving to Williamstown, MA, in order to deliver my work to The Harrison Gallery. I always enjoy these trips. I am usually filled with relief to be done with everything, for the moment anyway, and when Doug comes with, we always enjoy having a few hours of uninterrupted conversation,

The painting that I have posted today is one that I am very happy with and if we had more wall space I might consider keeping it. But we don't, so I am not and so it will be included in the show. Anyway, it's a big panel and the whole thing, start to finish, just burst right out of me. I can't explain it any better than that. I like the colors, the tree and I don't know what made me do it, but I especially love the blue at the horizon line on the left side. It's quite different than how I usually resolve those areas. And now, as is my habit, I will probably do that in every painting I do until Doug shakes me and tells me to stop!

So if you are anywhere close to the Berkshires this weekend, please come by the opening on Saturday, January 5, 5-7pm to see this fab painting for yourself, and/or to meet me and Doug. Or if you feel a bit shy about that, at least visit the gallery sometime in January, the show will be up until January 31st.

Oh, and I came across this article about the show. I think it is a press release from the gallery as much of it comes from my artist statement. Not the adjective "passionate" though. While I love to hear my work described as that I think my face would turn beet red if I ever described my own work as passionate!

Blogger Show Weekend

Brightness, 2007, Oil on Panel, 18x24

Well I meant to get this post up on Monday, however I had to get right to work Monday morning and that stretched into the whole day. No time to bask in the afterglow of our lovely weekend in NYC at all!

We left first thing Friday morning, but still managed to get to the city later than intended. I did a quick change at the hotel and Doug and I met up with Mary and her family (Mary is as nice in person as she is on her blog, and her family is wonderful) at Doug's showroom in Soho and then I dragged them off to my gallery a few doors down to show off view a few of my paintings. We chatted some more at the showroom and then had a quick dinner before they had to leave to catch a show. Doug and I went back to our room at the Soho Grand (I splurged, ok, I admit that I always splurge, I am very spoiled when it comes to hotels, so sue me) where were we watched tv and fell asleep by 10pm. Woo-hoo.

On Saturday I had hoped we would get down to Chelsea and visit a few galleries, but one of Doug's clients called and wanted to meet with him around noon. I decided to just walk around Soho, which is something I always enjoy doing and I visited all of my favorite little shops and galleries there. When I went back to the hotel there were a lot of paparazzi out front, they were there the whole weekend actually, but we never did find out who they were stalking looking for.

Finally we got to the opening and the first person we saw was Chris Rywalt, who gave me a big hug. While I am not really a hugger, I allowed this one (and actually I hugged and was hugged many times at this opening) because he wrote an awesome description about seeing my work for the first time and I was really feeling the love. Heh. I was very happy to meet his wife, Dawn, and I immediately liked her. Gradually I began to figure out who some of the other people were, after trying to connect blog photos with the real life in front of me and I have to say that I really got a kick out of introducing myself to people. I so enjoyed the recognition after I said my name (can you say shallow?), because it's so rare that anyone ever knows who I am. Anyway, I was pleased to be able to talk in person with so many of the people that I have read about over the last few years such as Sharon, Dan, Nancy, Stephanie, Susan, John, and my new best friend, Brent, who also said some nice things about my work and since I am easy, now I love him. Heh. A whole crowd of us went out for pizza after the opening ended and we all sat and chatted for hours. It was so much fun even if I did miss a few bloggers (Lisa, Steven, Martin) who couldn't make it to the opening.

Finally we all parted ways and Doug and I made our way back to the hotel. We decided to have a drink in the hotel lounge with all of the ultra cool, fashionable and thin people. We were perched seated at a tiny little table and chair set behind a couch with a couple on it who were making out about an inch away from my elbow. The music got noticeably louder every ten minutes and the only time we felt even remotely cool was when we told the (very cute) waiter that yes, we were staying at the hotel and please add the charge to our room. Oh and did I mention that we were by far the oldest people in the bar? We were.

On Sunday morning we had a great breakfast at a restaurant near the showroom and after buying a $27 dollar, 9 piece box of truffles with ingredients such as chili peppers, fennel, wasabi and paprika, for our babysitter, we headed home. While we were in the city, I was pretty sure I wanted to live there permanently, conveniently ignoring the financial ridiculousness of that ever happening. But all that was a distant fantasy once we got home to the farm, our kids, pets and near freezing temperatures.

Happy to go, happy to come back. Ain't that the way.

Thank you to John and Susan, and to everyone who helped organize and hang the show. It looked wonderful!

It's a Good Review

Moody Fall Day, 2007, Oil on Birch Panel, 12x16

And so because I am completely self involved, I signed myself up for Google Alerts earlier this year. Whenever my name shows up somewhere I get an email and a link to the item. It's not always me; often I get links to other Helgesons, including a basketball player who seemingly kicks butt for Purdue based on how often I hear about her.

However, besides the alert for my own posts, I have also been getting a lot of alerts lately, mostly because of The Blogger Show and my upcoming show at Boxheart Gallery in Pittsburgh. Today a review came in regarding a few pieces that Boxheart has included in a group show, currently on display. I don't get reviews too often, so when I do, expect to hear me crow about it! It was a positive article regarding the show, the artists and he discusses one of my paintings (shown below) plus he made mention of my solo show in November.

Speaking of which, I am very busy trying to finish up the pieces for that. I have to work every day until next Friday, when Doug and I are leaving to spend the weekend in NYC. And when I get back, I will have to begin packing up and shipping all of the work out right away.

Yikes! I wasn't stressed at all until I just wrote that down....

First View of the Morning, 2006, Oil on Panel, 18x24

Photos, Gardening and Art, Oh My!

Front and Center, 2007, Oil on Panel, 18x18

Well, thanks to Bart, I managed to actually get the fab photo of myself up on my profile. He sent me a few links to it and one of them worked. The problem is that I have been looking at the dang picture so much now that I don't think I like it anymore. But I am stuck with it for now because there is just not enough time in the world for me to figure out all of this computer crap.

I finished clearing out the hillside garden over the weekend, which is a load off my mind. It was hot, sticky and very buggy. I have 67 bug bites and I am totally not kidding, I counted them. Most of them are clustered around the best spots ever for itchy bug bites, elbows, knees and ankles and I admit to going a bit batty the last few days with all of that. But the good news is that I wore shorts outside and in public and 1. The world didn't stop spinning - no one laughed and pointed at me and 2. I got some color and so now my legs don't actually glow in the dark anymore. And the best news is that for at least a week or so, my garden will look like this.

Ignore the weeds in front. Clearly we need to mow and weed wack.

I got all of the weeds out (Doug helped a bit on the far end where the weeds were actually trying to pull me into the earth),
put in some new plants and then mulched. It will fill in a bit and will change quite a bit over the next few years but for now I am just happy to have momentarily conquered the burdock and dandelions.

The vegetable garden is almost completely planted and this year we decided to add strawberries, blueberries and raspberries. The strawberries should produce all summer and so I have added a trip to the garden to my morning chores in order to collect the ripe ones each day. And I must say here that our strawberries taste incredible, especially compared to store bought. It's amazing how you get used to the flavorless ones from the store after awhile. The blueberries are already ripening as well and I am really looking forward to those. I make a mean blueberry cobbler.

Oh yeah, art. Check out Susan's mention and a few pictures of my work over at Digging Pitt's blog. It's Three Rivers Arts Festival time in Pittsburgh and if you are nearby go check it out. I have a number of pieces on display in Boxheart's booth at the festival as well as in their gallery (see sidebar).