Art

Item Description

Jill Sutton is an artist living in Chicago exclusively represented by the Melanee Cooper Gallery.
Title: Dawn
Medium: Oil and graphite on board
Date: 2006
Size: 10" x 10"

Item Special Note

Artist Statement:

On the surface my work has changed significantly over the past few years. I have gone from painting landscapes, to deriving a body of painting based on family photographs, to working with complete abstraction. I say "on the surface," because the subject of my work has never really changed.

Regardless of what the painting depicts, my exploration remains consistent. Every painting I've done has been an investigation of light, color, atmosphere, surface, space, pattern, and structure. This is the subject of my work. Of course, so much more gets embedded into each piece. Every painting is autobiographical. Every painting is a record of my response to it, to the series, to other paintings I'm looking at, to the world outside my studio.

Each of my previous series began with a concrete idea. The paintings depict something nameable. As the series moves forward and I shed what I no longer need, the work moves closer to abstraction. I spent the last few years exploring a body of work based on photographs from my grandmother. She was a dancer in Chicago in the 30's and several of the photographs show her, along with her dance troupe, dancing on large decorated balls. The trick was to balance on these balls while moving them around the stage. I become more and more interested in these stage props and they eventually became the focus of my paintings.

The latest body of work is the first that began with abstraction. I am exacting elements from several previous series, and allowing them to develop into a language that is new. It is within the confines of this language that my subject of light, color, atmosphere, surface, space, pattern, and structure can evolve. The paintings themselves are rooted in the natural world and often allude to some geological, biological, or astronomical phenomena.

Artist Resume:

Selected Exhibitions "Echo," Elmhurst Art Museum, Elmhurst, IL, Solo Exhibition,2005 "Resident/Non-Resident," Chicago Art Source, Chicago, IL, Group Exhibition, 2004 "Chicago Art Open," Chicago, IL, Group Exhibition, 2004 "6th International Open," Woman Made Gallery, Chicago, IL, juried exhibition, Juror: Lisa Phillips, Director, New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York, 2003 "New Work," Gallery V, Columbus, OH, Two-Person Exhibition, 2002 "Location*Creation*Inspiration," Available Space Gallery, Chicago, IL, Group Exhibition, 2002 "Pilsen East Artists' Open House," Chicago, IL, Group Exhibition, 2001 "Summer Salon," Gallery V, Columbus OH, Gallery Artists' Group Exhibition, 2001 "The Lake Paintings," University of Illinois, Chicago, Chicago, IL, Group Exhibition, 2000 "Light, Space, Sea," Triangle Gallery of Old Town, Chicago, IL, Solo Exhibition, 2000 "Perceptions," Barrington Area Arts Council Gallery, Barrington, IL, Two-Person Exhibition, 1999 "Work," Builders Bank, Chicago, IL, Solo Exhibition, 1999 "New Places," Las Manos Gallery, Chicago, IL, 1998

Collections Quarles & Brady LLP Silicon Valley Bank The Illinois Institute of Art ING America Mercedes Benz Corporate Office Chemtech Plastics William Mercer, Inc. V. Allanti Group, Inc.