Kristin Schattenfield Rein, Kilauea, Bluestone Fine Art Gallery
Kristin Schattenfield Rein, Kilauea, Bluestone Fine Art Gallery, 301 North 3rd Street, Old City, Philadelphia.
The large gallery on 3rd Street is filled with flowing, liquid, dripping color fields, the panorama of the room reveals the expressive paintings relationships to one another. Some images seem to transfer their color ways from one canvas to another, flowing like a lava field across a molten plane at sunset. DoN talked to the artist about her inspiration for her one-person art show, Kilauea.
“I have two children now, aged two and one. And, it’s really interesting, my work has changed so much. I have some work over at 2nd Street that I made over and during my first child. It’s more meditative. I think of it as meditations, these colors are like meditations.”
Bluestone Fine Art Gallery is moving to 2nd Street across from the Clay Studio. The two year old corner gallery near Vine Street is transitioning to a new space in the Old City Arts District benefitting from the improved foot traffic of the arts and culture corridor.
“These paintings have transformed into this, sort of, idea of building and destruction. I took the idea of a volcano. And sort of germinated from that and like, a volcano and the Goddess Pele inhabits this volcano, Kilauea. That is sort of an allegory to parenthood, especially motherhood, because yes, you’re building them, but ultimately you’re kind of destroying them. I know that’s a harsh thing to say but, it’s like, I kind of work it out on the canvas.”
Kristin Schattenfield Rein, Kilauea, Bluestone Fine Art Gallery
Is it the idea of the restraint of childhood the artist is allegorizing in the paintings?
“I know I sound like a monster. But there is something monster-like. I mean, it’s horrible to say. But, it’s like a mother monster. Because it’s your entire job to form this nice, good, upstanding human. And within that you kind of have to, like, break them down. It’s a very weird thing. I have this two year old who is stretching, really feeling her oats, really figuring it out and with that I have to rein her in. And there’s something sad about that because you’re destroying a little bit of their ID. Or their animal. Because you have to. You cannot be an upstanding citizen and act like a child, in a weird way.
So, I’ve been really thinking about that and the volcano has always been in my mind. This idea of building and destruction, the top half is like the building of an island, or like the building of a child. And then the bottom is sort of the destruction. And what comes first? I don’t know. It’s cyclical; you build them up, you tear them down. A volcano erupts, it destroys, but, it ultimately builds the island.” – Kristin Schattenfield Rein
Kristin Schattenfield Rein, Kilauea, Bluestone Fine Art Gallery
DoN noted he was reminded of Gerhard Richter and Kristin Schattenfield Rein admitted he is a huge influence in her paintings. DoN aked, “Do you have a very messy studio?”
“I have a very messy studio. My work is very layer based, so I can tell you a couple things of the process. I find it really interesting to put materials that don’t normally go together. For a long time, I was doing latex and oil and the latex sort of acts as water. Oil and water want to pull apart, so you get this pulling away, pulling apart. And then I’ve been interested in doing this enamel, layers of enamel, which gives another different effect. Enamel paint, like sign paint, with oil paint on top of that, it’s given it a more volatile reaction, that I’ve been experimenting with, and I think it all comes back to the idea of the volcano. My stuff is so layered and it takes time, some come through me and it’s easy and some are beat up to hell.” – Kristin Schattenfield Rein
Kristin Schattenfield Rein, Kilauea, Bluestone Fine Art Gallery through March 29th, 2013. Artist talk and reception on March 22nd, 2 – 6:00pm.
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Written and photographed by DoN Brewer.
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