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| VIJA CELMINS |
Vija Celmins is an acclaimed US based Latvian-born painter, printmaker and draughtswoman. She graduated from UCLA in 1965 and later taught at UC Irvine. She now lives in New York. Celmins, abandoning Abstract Expressionism during its hey-day in the 1950s and early '60s, developed a series of life-size depictions of objects in her studio, painting what immediately surrounded her. She then turned towards painting, from memories and photographs, her native Latvia. For the next 15 years Celmins focused her precise artistic eye towards graphite drawings of natural surfaces. Upon moving to New York she returned to painting and printmaking where she focused on the observation of nature and space. Celmins is credited with keeping the genres of still life, marine and sky studies alive through the 1960s and '70s, in small, alluring paintings and drawings that often have an exquisite, calm air about them. Her work offered many off-centered connections with then-prevailing modes of Pop Art, Minimalism, Land Art, Conceptualism, and even Neo-Expressionism. By the early '80s, Celmin's obsession with her surroundings shifted to the celestial bodies. The print on the left is typical of her later work, showing the light of the stars by leaving small spots of white paper untouched. Celmins represents the difference between the illusion given off by an image and the reality of its actual support, be it canvas or paper. She reminds the viewer that he or she is looking at a painting or an etching, not at the heavens, as is the case here. Celmins emphasizes the importance of looking and describing when creating art and uses images to explore the process of making. The second half of the title, Uccello is a reference to Paolo Uccello , a Renaissance painter in Florence during the fifteenth century. Uccello is known for his contributions to the theory and practice of perspective in art which, during the Renaissance, had become extremely important and popular. Celmin's chalice closely resembles this drawing by Uccello.ARTISTS IN PERMANENT COLLECTION |
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 PANNELL ART GALLERY
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