Guest Artist to Be Featured at PJC

 

“The Color of Mood,” oil on linen paintings, will be 
included in the exhibit of guest artist, Deborah Paris, on display 
from September 29 through October 22, according to Paris Junior 
College Fine Arts Director, Cathie Tyler.

             Paris, a landscape painter working in oil and pastel, 
paints intimate landscapes that reflect her lifelong fascination with 
the subtleties and drama of the natural world. Veils of transparent 
color create luminous surfaces, inviting a long lingering look by the 
viewer.

             These paintings explore the fleeting effects of light 
and atmosphere at dawn, sunset, evening, dusk and night. Mystery and 
rich color invite one’s eyes to adjust and explore. Inspired by 
direct observation and memory, this work is more suggestive than 
descriptive, creating evocative associations between real and 
remembered places.

 

 

             Finding that less specificity of detail leads to a 
richness in sense of place, Paris uses luminous color to conjure up 
the many moods of the day-serene, quiet, sensual, mysterious and even 
melancholy. Her technique, which involves applying layers of 
transparent glazes juxtaposed with translucent and opaque passages, 
and celebrating the texture of the linen canvas, creates an optically 
complex surface, and a visual feast for the viewer.

             Paris has been featured in American Artist, Southwest 
Art and The Pastel Journal. She was named an Artist to Watch by 
Southwest Art Magazine. Her work has been shown at the Laguna Art 
Museum, the Albuquerque Museum of Art, and the Panhandle-Plains 
Museum. In 2006 her work was featured in two new books, “Landscapes 
of New Mexico” (Fresco Fine Art Publications) and “Plein Air New 
Mexico” (Jack Richeson Art Publications.

             The exhibit will open with a reception on September 29 
from 4:30-6 p.m. in the Art Foyer Gallery on the PJC campus. There is 
no charge for the exhibit and the public is invited to attend.
             Ms. Paris will be conducting a one-day workshop in Plein 
Aire painting with PJC students on Friday, October 9. There is a 
limited enrollment for interested persons from the community through 
Paris Junior College’s Continuing Education Department. En plein aire 
is a French expression which means "in the open air", and is 
particularly used to describe the act of painting outdoors.

             “I look for the extraordinary in the intimate, ordinary 
landscape – the moment when light and atmosphere create a bridge 
between outward movement and inner standstill” said Paris.
             For more information about the exhibit or workshop, call 
903-782-0460. To register for the workshop, call 903-782-0447 or 
903-782-0445.

 

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