ABOUT JANET SNELL
Janet Snell is a Magna Cum Laude graduate of The Maryland Institute, College of Art, where she studied painting with the late Edward Dugmre. She has been included in many group and solo shows including New York’s Drawing Center, Washington’s Strathmore Hall, Cleveland’s Spaces, and Akron’s Summit Art Space. The author of FLYTRAP (Cleveland Poetry Center 1990) – a book of drawings and poems, and an E-chapbook, HEADS (March Street Press 1998). Her collection, PRISONER’S DILEMMA, with Cheryl Snell, won the Lopside Press Chapbook Contest. Snell regularly publishes in small magazines, contributes to chapbooks for Scattered Light Library, and paints semi-realistic portraits on commission.
ARTIST STATEMENT:
Miles Davis’ jazz fusion, Turner’s mature work of storms, fire and vague buildings in the background, Picasso’s Les Demoilles d’Avignon, Kandinsky’s improvisations, Gorky’s subliminal imagery combined with lyrical color, DeKooning with his women series-all used figuration and abstraction, and serve as my models. Themes of pursuing vision-trying to see what blocks understanding; entrapment, relationships between people – are all subjects for my work, and lend themselves to oil paint because it has fluidity. Since it doesn’t dry too fast, I can go from one space to another, and that allows me to show a metamorphoses from space to image, tracking my thought processes.
Science interests me, it’s controlled randomness – like the somewhat unpredictable trajectory of an electron or the element of chance in natural selection, ot a Degas where the figures (dancers) are arranged in what seems to be a randomness, but the composition is still very much controlled. There is some chance in my drawings when I put white over grey chalk and charcoal and end up in a fit of pique, slashing the white with more charcoal and finish up with a texture and a degree of dark–light that works well with the whole drawing. That moment of chance is stored as experience.
Music inspires me – Hendrix, Miles Davis, Waits, classical music. Music creates an environment that allows an image to pop up in my head. It’s not a completely formed image. I don’t want it to be. I want something spontaneous to happen when I start to draw or paint. After losing and getting back the drawing many times, I can recapture the original image. German Expressionists like Gorky, Max Ernst, Schiel, Bacon, and most especially Munch, have influenced my work greatly. I’m not completely an expressionist, though. There’s an objectivity and logic and subjectivity in the space I create, and some realism in the image, usually a head. So I’m not entirely self indulgent and personal!
-Janet Snell
Standing Rock Cultural Arts is a 501(c)(3) organization. We are always looking for sponsors to help cover expenses for our art and educational activities. Donations are tax deductible
Event Description:“Janet Snell By Herself” Art Exhibition