Betsy Kendall - Marking Home Ground

BETSY KENDALL Marking Home Ground

DIRECTOR’S FOREWORD

Marking Home Ground, by Betsy Kendall, represents an opportunity to view her wonderful artwork. This exhibit showcases her landscape paintings inspired by the areas around her home in Berkeley, California. Juxtaposing urban spaces with the natural landscape, Betsy Kendall’s work evokes a sense of place and belonging. This idea of home permeates Kendall’s landscapes. The visual narrative of these spaces conveys a human story of our place in this realm as well as a more personal message. Some of her work reveals bits of the wild remaining within man-made environments, prevailing in spaces that have been altered by humanity, while other pieces show humanity’s intrusion upon previously untamed locations. Kendall is also expressing her personal connection to the landscape, preferring to paint the scenery close to her home, her surroundings. Through her artwork, she strives to express her relationship with these familiar places, documenting them on her canvases.

Although Betsy Kendall works from observation within the environment she is painting, her works are not meant to be an exact replica of what is seen. Instead, she captures the place at that moment and time through her expressive colors and gestural brushstrokes, imbuing the work with life. The landscape is con stantly evolving and changing and as viewers and we feel this sense of energy in Kendall’s paintings. The artist states that she is influenced by the processes and approaches of the Abstract Expressionists. This is evident in her landscapes which bridge abstraction and realism. As viewers we can see the direction that her paintbrush takes over the canvas, creating vibrancy and movement throughout her compositions. She paints a particular location with its various features while at the same time illuminating her personal con nection to the place, her home ground.

I am very excited to exhibit Betsy Kendall’s work for others to enjoy. I would like to extend my gratitude to the many colleagues that have been instrumental in making this exhibition possible- Betsy Kendall for the opportunity to exhibit her incredible work; Kory Twaddle, Gallery Assistant, for organizing and arrang ing the show details; Brad Peatross of the School of the Arts, California State University, Stanislaus for the catalog design; and Parks Printing for the production of the catalogs. I also want to express my apprecia tion to the Instructionally Related Activities Program of California State University, Stanislaus, as well as anonymous donors for the funding of the exhibition and catalogue.

Ellen Roehne Interim Director, University Art Galleries

California State University, Stanislaus

A Walk Through Muddy Hollow (Triptych), oil on 3 canvases 24” x 90”, 2019

Looking Out to Marin & Red Island, Pt Richmond, oil on panel, 16” x 20”, 2022

BETSY KENDALL - Home Ground

What connects us humans? Shared experiences. Seeing things together. Talking about them. Making a painting is a way to affirm and share our experiences with people we may never meet. Seeing a painting can take me to a different place, or let me see a known experience in a different way. Making a painting does the same thing, in a more granular way. Place is very important to me, as I lived so many places as a child. So I choose to paint a known place, my home ground. To know it better, and to share it. Even though I only paint the areas near me (in Berkeley), each place seems different over time. I find the variety endless. There is always joy, chaos, color, light, movement: the things I love about paint and and about being outdoors. So it seems right to emphasize these in my landscapes. In particular, the places human works come up against the natural inspire me. Each shows off the other. The natural asserts itself in the urban, while the human intrudes on the wild. Nature bats last, but here we are in its midst.

Starting out in college my heroes were David Park, Joan Brown, Joan Mitchell. I loved and absorbed the expressive marks, and the idea that one stroke suggests the next. As I grew older, I longed to connect the process with my home ground to tell a story, which I do now. I still paint the whole painting at once, as the Abstract Expressionists taught. When there is a satisfying rhythm across the surface, I stop. I favor paintings that teeter on the edge between the abstract and the representative. A tipping point, which lets the viewer see new things in the painting at different times, enables a sense of discovery. Which is my experience while painting in the landscape. Marking my home ground, I share it in paint.

I look to see a landscape from the inside. How do the trees feel as they bump against one another or hover above a trail? What’s it like walking through the grasses under the sky? I hope you walk through the marks on the canvas as though they were sentient, the way one does in a Japanese ink painting.

Betsy Kendall

Albany Hill, 9AM, oil on panel, 12” x 16”, 2022

Buildings with Truck and Turkeys, Field Station, oil on panel,15” x 22”, 2021

Cemetery Oak, oil on panel, 12” x 12”, 2022

Fog Clearing, Meeker Slough, oil on canvas, 30” x 30”, 2018

Fall Buildings, Meeker Slough, oil on panel, 22” x 18”, 2021

Ferry Point, Spring, oil on canvas, 36” x 24” 2022

Library Corner, oil on canvas, 24” X 30”, 2019

Road Narrows, Live Oak Park, oil on canvas, 18” x 21”, 2013

Molate Quonset Huts, Spring, oil on canvas, 18” x 24”, 2022

Slow, oil on canvas, 30” x 40”, 2011

Mt Diablo, Walnut Creek, oil on canvas, 32” x 46”, 2019

Old Ranch Land, Cummings Skyway, oil on canvas, 30” x 36” 2010

Windy at the Top, oil on panel, 24” x 24”, 2019

Windy Poplars on the Marsh, oil on canvas, 18” x 24”, 2022

Summer Marsh with Industry, oil on canvas, 30” x 30”, 2018

Trail Back, Albany Bulb, oil on canvas, 24” x 30”, 2011

Camelia Street Trees, oil on canvas, 12” x 16”, 2015 (Private collection)

Gateway, oil on canvas, 18” x 18”, 2013 (Private collection)

Exotic Pioneers, oil on canvas, 16” x 20”, 2012 (Private collection)

Grown Up Weeds, Albany Bulb, oil on canvas, 24” x 30”, 2016

Meeker Slough High, oil on canvas, 36” x 24” (Private collection)

Miller Knox Park from Above, oil on canvas, 30” x 24”, 2016 (Private collection)

Meeker Cerrito Clouds, oil on canvas, 24” x 30”, 2016

Pt Richmond View, oil on canvas, 16” x 20”, 2016 (Private collection)

BETSY KENDALL CV

Betsy Kendall grew up with a frustrated artist mother; her father was busy representing the American Way for the State Department. They always found amazing sights to see. Mother kept her and sisters busy making things.

The family moved every 2 or 3 years, from Venezuela, to Japan, Spain, Panama and Chile. Intervals “stateside” meant home in DC, or road trips: visiting family in Texas, Louisiana, North Carolina, the Midwest, with stops in National Parks.

Places zipped by. Places are the constant mystery, even as one stays in place.

Kendall met the East Bay Area while at Mills College in the 1970s. For a while she tried environmental activism, with her naturalist husband, in Ohio and Mendocino county. They moved to Berkeley for good in 1989. She paints outdoors and in her Berkeley studio. More of her landscapes at ShoH FineArts Gallery, betsykendall.com, or @kendall.bets on Instagram

EDUCATION

1985 M.A. Art, San Francisco State University

1975 B.A. Art Mills College

1973 Rhode Island School of Design

SOLO SHOWS

2019 Betsy Kendall: Landscapes, Shoh Fine Arts, Berkeley

Wild Here: Local Landscapes, Albany Community Center, Albany CA

2018 Betsy Kendall: Collaborations with the Muse, Barry Sakata Gallery, Sacramento

2014 Betsy Kendall: Landscape/Studio, Stanford Art Spaces, DeWitt Cheng, curator

2011 Nearby Wild, Landscape show, Montclair Gallery, Oakland

2008 Tree Spirit: Betsy Kendall Landscapes, David Turner Sculpture, Alta Bates Community Gallery

GROUP SHOWS

2022 Summerscape 2022, ShoH Fine Arts, Berkeley

Face to Face, National Juried Show, ARC Gallery, San Francisco

Human Faces and Figures (online), Las Laguana Art Gallery

2020 Bird, Nest, Nature juried show, Bedford Gallery, Walnut Creek

Beyond: Group Landscape Show, ShoH Fine Arts

2019 Three Local Landscape Painters, North Berkeley Investment Partners

2018 Bay Area Life 2018, first place award, Valley Art Gallery, Walnut Creek Road Trip group landscape show, Shoh Arts, Berkeley

2017 Honoring the Legacy of David Park, Santa Clara University Art Gallery

2016 Figure, Gray Loft Gallery, Oakland CA

Untamed: Wild in the City, Visions of the Wild, Vallejo Museum, Vallejo CA

Beauty of Water, Arts Benicia @ City Hall, Benicia CA

2015 Into the Wild: Celebrating Western Wilderness, Carl Cherry Center for the Arts, Carmel, CA

2014 Retold Tales: Collage and Assemblage, Mythos Fine Art @ Firehouse North Gallery

Au Naturel, The Nude in the 21st Century (juried show), Clatsop Community College, Astoria, OR

Wilderness 50: Celebrating Western Wilderness, Vallejo Museum, Vallejo

2013 Berkeley Seen, (invitational show), Firehouse North Gallery, Berkeley

2012 Scapes: (Juried show), Pacific Art League, Palo Alto

Changing Scene, Valley Art Gallery, Walnut Creek, Featured Artist, October Artists Honor the Oakland LGBT community, Oakland City Hall (4 artists)

Seeing Solano III: Solano Land Trust through the eyes of artists, Vacaville Museum

Berkeley Civic Arts Commission Selection, Berkeley Civic Center

Au Naturel, The Nude in the 21st Century, third place award, Clatsop Community College, Astoria OR New Places: Four Painters’ California, Firehouse North Gallery, Berkeley

2011 Seeing Solano: Artists view the Solano Land Trust, Vallejo Historical Museum (Invitational)

2D 3D Figurative Works juried show, second place award, San Joaquin Delta College Center for the Arts, Stockton

2008 Go Figure: Working Together from a Model, The Carl Cherry Center for the Arts, Carmel

Carpe Diem: Landscapes, Canessa Gallery, San Francisco

2007 Partners in Paint: the Tuesday Drawing Group, Addison Windows Gallery, Berkeley

2004 Rendering & Articulation: A Drawing Exhibit , The Carl Cherry Center of the Arts, Carmel

The American Landscape: Mountains–Metropolis, Alameda Art Center

1999 Betsy Kendall & Elizabeth Ennis, Sticks Fine Arts, Berkeley

1998 Betsy Kendall & Carlo Ferretti, Sticks Fine Arts, Berkeley

The Watershed Landscape, Arts Benicia

Alternate Views of Diablo (three-person Landscape show), Diablo Valley College

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

CALIFORNIA STATE UNIVERSITY, STANISLAUS

Dr. Ellen Junn, President

Dr. Kimberly Greer, Provost/Vice President of Academic Affairs

Dr. James A. Tuedio, Dean, College of the Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences

DEPARTMENT OF ART

Martin Azevedo, Associate Professor, Chair

Tricia Cooper, Lecturer

Dean De Cocker, Professor

James Deitz, Lecturer

Daniel Edwards, Associate Professor

Patrica Eshagh, Lecturer

Jessica Gomula-Kruzic, Professor

Daniel Heskamp, Lecturer

Chad Hunter, Lecturer

Dr. Carmen Robbin, Professor

Ellen Roehne, Lecturer

Dr. Staci Scheiwiller, Associate Professor

Susan Stephenson, Associate Professor

Jake Weigel, Associate Professor

Mirabel Wigon, Assistant Professor

Alex Quinones Instructional Tech II

Kyle Rambatt, Equipment Technician II

UNIVERSITY ART GALLERIES

Dean De Cocker, Director

Kory Twaddle, Gallery Assistant

SCHOOL OF THE ARTS

Brad Peatross, Graphic Specialist II

Betsy Kendall - Marking Home Ground

October 28–December 21, 2022 | Stan State Art Space, California State University, Stanislaus | 226 N. First St., Turlock, CA 95380

100 copies printed. Copyright © 2022 California State University, Stanislaus • ISBN 978-1-940753-72-0

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written permission of the publisher.

This exhibition and catalog have been funded by Associated Students Instructionally Related Activities, California State University, Stanislaus.