Paper Places
Home is where the heart is.
The Paper Places series portray landscapes across the U.S., Canada, Australia, Mexico, and Costa Rica. By allowing the intuition to lead the way, each illustration is deliberately varied, imparting the unique nature of different locations.
Oil pastels colors are layered, lightly at first, then thick and scratched away using a pottery tool, my nails and whatever works. With expressionistic style, areas are rebuilt, removed and rebuilt again. A common technique is to smudge and blend, but in my opinion, leaving bits of pure colors side by side emphasizes more livliness through impressionistic textures. This process happens to some degree in all of my work in various mediums, but is explored more consciously in this series.
During 2002 we changed residence to the Southern United States from Canada where I had established a small business working freelance for many years. Moving to a new country offered the opportunity to fresh-start my career and aim for higher potential as a mature artist. At the personal level every piece in this series celebrates an appreciation for the places I’ve been fortunate to visit or live. Home is certainly where the heart is.
The series inspired the following poem:
It remains
When things are gone
and people
passed and roads
and paths and places
we belong
to the essence.
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Each piece in the Paper Places series is 11x14" inches |
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oil pastels, graphite, dry pastels |
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3" White double mats |
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classic style wood frame with white on white crackle finish |
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total size 26 x 22 inches |
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| Reframed, now with brass title plates March 2010 |  |
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The framing of the Paper Places series is presently upgraded, and will be available for purchase again soon. Each 11 x 14 inches Oil Pastels on paper will now have an extra white mat over the existing white double mat, plus a title plate, framed in the classic simplicity of white wood frames, 22 x 26 inches with a crackle finish.
A total six inches of white surround each drawing. Each were designed so to hang closely together in a limited space if need be, and still be appreciated as individual pieces. Available for purchase again soon.
Please contact
nikki_coulombe@hotmail.com if you have any questions, comments or suggestions about this or any artwork seen on this website.