What is your background and what drives you to paint? I completed a bachelor of arts, honours fine arts with a studio specialization at the University of Waterloo followed by a bachelor of education at Wilfrid Laurier University. I hold an MFA from Western University. I'm based in Waterloo and paint full time in my studio in downtown Kitchener. I'm drawn to painting because of its versatility in terms of colour and saturations and its flexibility in application. What are your inspirations/influences and what themes do you pursue in your work? There are a series of confluences that converge on my canvasses. The subject matter is largely the public crowd as a single entity. Some themes in the work are, for example, social influences, gender identities, age related issues, disability, fashion and are illustrated through colour theory and abstract and representational painting.  How has your practice developed over your career?
My practice has become more established as a daily practice of making. I prepare my surfaces by stretching canvas and other cloth over wooden stretchers and prime the surface with layers on layers until it feels right with a certain amount of smooth to tooth ratio before I can begin painting. I have developed a 'prep, paint, plan' method as part of my daily practice to keep my momentum. Prep - prepare my surfaces, Paint - paint something, some days, paint anything! Plan - take time to plan for new work, jot down ideas, reading, make study of a new idea, draw, see a show, art talk, podcast etc... As much of the imagery in your paintings often deals with public encounters and crowds, has the limited social gathering of this past year affected the way you create or think about your work in any way? The lack of source material this year, because I take my own photos for paintings, has resulted in a re examination of the photos I have. So, I'm reusing images from the past in new paintings. What ideas are involved in your current work for the upcoming show? I'm still committed to making work about our social interactions in public spaces. My attention has turned toward the relationship between representation and abstraction through figurative painting.
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I spent my money on “How To” art books and dabbled in oil painting on cheap paper and the back of vinyl wallpaper samples. As a young adult I was intrigued by the watercolour practice of my aunt and began to explore this medium for a couple of decades. My love for drawing, painting and colour were intrinsically woven into my fabric as a person that I recognized that life and painting were not separate. What are the inspirations or influences that are involved in your work and are there any specific themes that you choose to focus on? I am a faith filled person. I believe in God. This belief has a profound effect on my life and my practice as an artist. My work is influenced by the struggles and imperfections of our lives and the pursuit of coming to a resolution or acceptance of our surroundings. The struggle between chaos and order, light and dark, is profoundly manifested when I encounter and contemplate a landscape. The layering of paint on my canvas is a slow meditative process that considers all the parts, ever changing but still offering a glimpse into what is hidden.
How has your practice developed over your career? As a self-taught artist, I have always challenged myself to study, learn, and practice art. I started with oil painting but when life became busy with raising a family, I switched to using watercolour because it suited my lifestyle. Although landscape was predominant in my work I dabbled in still life and figures. I painted small intimate watercolours for many years. I began to teach art and explored many mediums in the classroom while concentrating on painting at home. Gradually my small paintings grew in size and when my desire to paint larger than watercolour paper would allow, I switched to acrylic painting. My youngest daughter, while in university introduced me to building frames and stretching my own canvas. This opened up a world of possibility for me and set me on a journey of painting on large canvas which I continue to do to this day. The way you layer organic forms is so captivating, can you tell me more about your process? Do your compositions come about intuitively? My compositions are contemplatively planned. I strive to be purposeful and direct. The landscape provides me with visual prompts that engage my thoughts and struggles. I photograph what I see, I remember what I experience. When there is an experience, there is a story to tell. I record thoughts in a journal and work out details of my process and colour theory before I put a mark on canvas. I graph my canvas and meticulously begin to draw my shapes. I fill in the spaces with codes that only I understand, basically I create a visual map to keep me organized when I am ready to apply paint. I project my image on a screen for inspiration. I begin by laying my canvas flat and applying a watery layer of paint, often laying down various colours referring to my inspiration photo often. When dry, I place my canvas on an easel and make more marks and begin to paint very slowly with one colour or area at a time. Slowly shapes and patterns emerge as I intuitively move away from referring to my photo. Each layer provides new life but simultaneously reveals small glimpses of what lies underneath. What ideas or projects have you been currently working on for the upcoming show? Have the events of the past year affected your art in any way? The pandemic coincided with a purposeful plan I had for 2020 and onward. I realize for many that the pandemic altered life dramatically but for me it assisted my goals of spending more time in my studio and stepping back from my work as a volunteer and advocate in the community. I am accustomed to creating bodies of work while working on one theme with great intent on purpose. In the past year I have given myself permission to honour my mark-making and see value in every work that I create. I’m actually surprised when I look back at my present body of work as I perceive changes in the way I paint. I recognize that what I experience, my contentment along with distress has translated more onto canvas this year than ever before. It is very apparent in my body of work. One will note conspicuous differences between the work as I communicated very strongly through colour and mark-making.
Often working intuitively, Hollingdrake's work explores her individual and acquired painting ideas with a focus on how colour and texture interact with visual space. Her work is often influenced by nature and plant life. On her latest works Hollingdrake states, "moving from my usual gestural abstract and into including plants, I had a breakthrough moment by holding the plant stem in one hand and my paint brush in the other. This helped me capture just the essence of the plant shapes for my interpretation without the formality of a still life. My desire is to keep them loose and painterly and all about colour."
ABOUT THE SHOW
This series of paintings celebrate the seed of creativity. A seed remains intact and stagnant until there is someone to plant and nurture it. These paintings reflect this process, recognizing that nothing can be realized without forethought and action. Like this theoretical seed, an idea also needs energy to propel it forward. There will always be missteps and readjustments, frustration and joy; with time and experience, you learn to trust in the process. Eventually, with gentle nudges and a willingness to keep going, something will emerge. You can take a breath and give thanks to that tiniest of seed."
She uses the ancient technique of encaustic to create her paintings and uses heat as a primary element in her process to control beeswax, resin and pigment. On the subject matter of her work, she describes that "My rural surroundings find themselves in my paintings, whether it is a meadow, bird sitting in a tree or some of the farm animals."
ABOUT THE SHOW
This series of paintings celebrate the seed of creativity. A seed remains intact and stagnant until there is someone to plant and nurture it. These paintings reflect this process, recognizing that nothing can be realized without forethought and action. Like this theoretical seed, an idea also needs energy to propel it forward. There will always be missteps and readjustments, frustration and joy; with time and experience, you learn to trust in the process. Eventually, with gentle nudges and a willingness to keep going, something will emerge. You can take a breath and give thanks to that tiniest of seed.
About the Planting Seeds exhibition Sharon states, "the show is about seeds and that is quite a recurring theme in my work. The first mark is a seed, our thoughts, movements and actions are seeds. Then what comes next is a result of that first mark. I hope these paintings plant seeds in the viewers imagination too. Perhaps they will be seeds to help them recall an experience or a dream that touched them."  ABOUT THE SHOW
This series of paintings celebrate the seed of creativity. A seed remains intact and stagnant until there is someone to plant and nurture it. These paintings reflect this process, recognizing that nothing can be realized without forethought and action. Like this theoretical seed, an idea also needs energy to propel it forward. There will always be missteps and readjustments, frustration and joy; with time and experience, you learn to trust in the process. Eventually, with gentle nudges and a willingness to keep going, something will emerge. You can take a breath and give thanks to that tiniest of seed." |
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