FAR REACHES Catalogue

FA R R E AC H E S ANSEL

McARDLE

ST E D H A M

FAR REACHES Copyright Š 2015 by Ellsworth Gallery

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form by any electronic or mechanical means including photocopying, recording, or information storage and retrieval without permission in writing from the author.

ELLSWORTH GALLERY 215 East Palace Street Santa Fe, NM 87501 505-989-7900 www.ellsworthgallery.com info@ellsworthgallery.com

ELISE ANSEL

Artist Elise Ansel makes paintings that are derived from Old Master depictions of bacchanals, interiors, and figures in the landscape. The paintings she works from are distant mirrors which she interprets through the lens of gestural abstraction. Ansel conducts us through the veil that time draws across memory, following the invisible thread that connects her images to their historical origins in Europe. She views the paintings she works from as structures on which to hang paint; the soundness of these structures capacitates great improvisational freedom. The real subject becomes the substance and surface of oil paint, the variety of its applications, and the ways in which it can be used to celebrate life.

A New York City native based in Portland, ME, Ansel studied Visual Art and Comparative Literature at the Rhode Island School of Design and Brown University. She earned an MFA in Visual Art from Southern Methodist University, and has exhibited her work throughout the United States and Europe. Her paintings are currently touring the United Kingdom in the “Young Masters� exhibiton, and were selected by Mel Kendrick for inclusion in the Artists Choose Artists exhibition at the Parrish Art Museum in Water Mill, NY. Her work is on exhibition in the Summer Exhibition 2015 at the Royal Academy in London.

Held without interruption since 1769, its earliest exhibitors included Reynolds, Constable and Turner.

Blue I (after Breugel), 2014 oil on canvas 16 x 20 in

Calling V (after Caravaggio), 2014 oil on canvas 24 x 24 in

Calling IV (after Caravaggio), 2015 oil on canvas 24 x 24 in

Grape Harvest III (after Goya), 2015 oil on linen 30 x 22 in

Flight I (after Poussin), 2015 oil on canvas 18 x 24 in

Red Ribbon (detail)

Red Ribbon (after Ingres), 2015 oil on linen 30 x 22 in

Truth Rescued by Time (after Goya), 2014 oil on linen 30 x 25 in

Spring II (after Goya), 2015 oil on canvas 14 x 18 in

Walking (after de Hooch), 2015 oil on linen 11 x 14 in

DĂŠjeuner II (after Manet), 2015 oil on linen 24 x 30 in

CLAIRE McARDLE

After earning a BFA at Virginia Commonwealth University, Claire McArdle moved to Italy to work with master carvers in Carrara. She continues to travel to Italy to quarry and rough out her works in marble and travertine. Her style has been influenced by classical figures and the soul that speaks within tribal art.

Her energy for exploring these mysteries and an insatiable passion for working stone, clay, and bronze, combine to create forms with harmonious balance and an ethereal quality.

McArdle says, “My work is an extension of my constant revisiting of these myths and mysteries as I try to bridge the relationship between the ancient world and our modern existence. I aim to create timeless work that resonates with spirit.

In this process, I develop expressions of my personal mythology, bound to my ancestors through the archetype, altered by the world in which I live, made unique by my hand.”

McArdle’s works are in private and public collections throughout the United States, Europe, Mexico and Japan. She was selected to carve marble sculptures on-site for two public parks in Japan. McArdle’s commissions for public, educational, and religious institutions include monumental works for Spring Hill College, Mobile, AL, Marian House, Baltimore, MD, The Holton-Arms School, Bethesda, MD, St. Bede, Williamsburg, VA, Holy Trinity Church, Washington, DC, Holy Redeemer College, Washington, DC as well as many private commissions.

Blue, 2013 terra cotta, terra sigillata 22 x 22 x 15 in

Torso Luminoso, 2013 Carrara Marble 24 x 21 x 7 in

Torso Luminoso (back)

Il Ponte Vecchio, 2013 Italian travertine 24 x 21 x 7 in

Il Ponte Vecchio (back)

Francesca, 2015 pink Portuguese marble 37 x 9 x 9 in

Francesca (back)

Torso Twilight, 2014 calacatta Carrara marble 39 x 18 x 18 in

Torso Twilight (back)

KATHRYN STEDHAM

Kathryn Stedham first smelled linseed oil at age four and has been painting ever since. Classically trained and an accomplished abstract painter, with her latest body of work Stedham returns to her roots, painting wild horses and landscapes of the American Southwest. Stedham’s landscapes are infused with a deep sense of listening, of intimacy with place. They are informed by her longtime Zen practice and by techniques of abstraction. She pushes the paint around with physicality and dynamism, scrapes into it, allows it to drip sometimes.

“I have a great love of drawing, and I missed that feeling of rendering form,” Stedham says. “Every painting is of a place that has lodged itself in my being.” She conveys the essence of that place through nuanced, nameless colors, warm in the foreground and cooling with distance. “Each painting teaches me something different.”

Stedham was born in Seoul; before settling in Santa Fe, she lived a nomadic life, painting wherever she traveled. The recipient of three NEA grants and fellowships, she has completed four major public art commissions and been featured in more than 50 exhibitions. Her work is collected internationally.

Tree, 2015 oil on canvas 20 x 30 in

The Goodship, 2015 oil on canvas 48 x 30 in

First Light, Opera, 2015 oil on canvas 30 x 24 in

Over & Around, 2015 oil on canvas 18 x 14 in

Midday Cliffs at Abiquiu, 2015 oil on canvas 30 x 24 in

Evening Approaches, After a Day Spent With You, 2015 oil on canvas 30 x 20 in

Seen Through, 2015 oil on canvas 48 x 30 in

Evening Approaches II, 2015 oil on canvas 20 x 16 in

Pedernal Mesa in Blue, 2015 oil on canvas 20 x 16 in

Birth of Night, 2015 oil on canvas 36 x 24 in

Two’s Company, 2015 oil on canvas 36 x 24 in

Late Day Rio with Small Black Mesa, 2015 oil on canvas 36 x 48 in

Light Plays II, 2015 oil on canvas 20 x 16 in

Photography for Elise Ansel: Portraits by Laura Lewis, Artwork by Luc Demers Photography for Claire McArdle: Jafe Parsons Kathryn Stedham biography by Kristin Barendsen Photography for Kathryn Stedham: Jamie Hart Images courtesy of the artists (c) 2015, Elise Ansel, Claire McArdle and Kathyrn Stedham, all rights reserved

ELLSWORTH GALLERY Santa Fe

NM