The Idea of Color
Spring 2024
Solo Exhibition | Julia Kottal
Second Floor Gallery
Solo Exhibition | Julia Kottal
Second Floor Gallery
Exhibit Info & Statement
February 19, 2024 - May 11, 2024
The Idea of Color
Communication between the color and the composition hinge on one another. I see color next to each other as blocks or shapes, like stained glass or quilting, and how I develop those shapes into the composition is vital. How the hues converse with each other is how I proceed. Timing and chance are all-encompassing when working in oils as well as watercolor. The blending of colors in both instances happens in a fleeting moment, defined by my mark, to discover the happenstance of a new tone. The idea of color is powerful. Color-play in abstraction is my greatest curiosity—constantly generating new relationships through the process of being a willing participant, responding with the fluidity of the paint.
Beginning with the simplicity of a horizon line, I infuse my current vision and what exists as we recognize to be a landscape. The two combine—past and present mental visions, a blended perspective as I see it. From there, the color and energy of the sky dictates the hues of the land or water. No structures, no realism. A sense of landscape unfolds in the composition.
While in the process of painting, I’m consistently thinking and questioning what shouldn’t work when laying color next to another. Do they clash? Do they match in intensity and value, or not? What emotional response becomes of that interaction? Sweeping and bold marks of color are the catalyst to keep me going until I see the end. I search for the “ah” moment, when the composition has finally reached a balance, harmony. I want to look and say, those combinations shouldn’t work, yet they do, and it’s a delightful result.
This statement is particular to the last few years of painting. The recent few years have been a lot to process for all of us, let alone what happens at a smaller scale in our personal lives. I feel I’ve had to reacquaint myself with painting. I’m influenced by the way color happens in the works of Helen Frankenthaler, Joan Mitchell, and Mark Rothko. Each vastly different in style, but all brilliant grand designers of the idea of color.
-Julia
Beginning with the simplicity of a horizon line, I infuse my current vision and what exists as we recognize to be a landscape. The two combine—past and present mental visions, a blended perspective as I see it. From there, the color and energy of the sky dictates the hues of the land or water. No structures, no realism. A sense of landscape unfolds in the composition.
While in the process of painting, I’m consistently thinking and questioning what shouldn’t work when laying color next to another. Do they clash? Do they match in intensity and value, or not? What emotional response becomes of that interaction? Sweeping and bold marks of color are the catalyst to keep me going until I see the end. I search for the “ah” moment, when the composition has finally reached a balance, harmony. I want to look and say, those combinations shouldn’t work, yet they do, and it’s a delightful result.
This statement is particular to the last few years of painting. The recent few years have been a lot to process for all of us, let alone what happens at a smaller scale in our personal lives. I feel I’ve had to reacquaint myself with painting. I’m influenced by the way color happens in the works of Helen Frankenthaler, Joan Mitchell, and Mark Rothko. Each vastly different in style, but all brilliant grand designers of the idea of color.
-Julia
About the Artist
Julia is a native mid-westerner born in Michigan. She studied art in Florida, Maryland and California before moving to Iowa in 1992. She has a B.A., with painting as her emphasis, from Coe College. Her work has been exhibited nationally and found in private and public collections including Alliant Energy, Cedar Rapids Museum of Art, Coe College, Miami University, Millhiser Smith, Terry Lockridge and Dunn, and United Fire Group, among others. Her works are characterized by the loose interpretation of the landscape as abstract oil on canvas and watercolor on paper. She is currently a full-time artist.
Video/CAtalogue
KCCK Culture Crawl |
Catalogue
The Idea of Color
Paperback $34 |
Exhibit Images
