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Some of the greatest art takes us to new and imaginative worlds, yet
the unique and powerful artistry of Maggie Remington reminds us that
it is here and now, where we stand on the earth, in this world, after
all. Maggie is a "southwestern landscape painter" of a new
breed. Home base is Montrose, Colorado (summers) and Tulum, Mexico (winters).
Both are but one of the many places she does landscape work, which is
created on the landscape, with the landscape. Honest and true, this
work has the local flavors of gold, green, blue, orange and brown with
names like: "Upper Colona, Ouray, Colorado"; "Grand Mesa,
Colorado"; "Tiyoweh Trails, Montrose, Colorado." Remington
uses the earth, literally, to create her art and the earth responds,
dancing with her—and her viewers—as she creates or they
view.
Remington has been compelled to produce this wonderful work traveling
throughout the West and Mexico. Her palette is the earth's sometimes
subtle, sometimes vibrant pigments; her easel is the ground on which
she walks, each canvas completed and carefully dated, given the geographical
name of the place she stopped to get to know. Her methods are logical
madness, ambitious and sweaty, the results of hiking and digging, mixing
and hauling mud and sand, crushed rock applied by hand, twig or weed.
The results are beautiful large canvases, rather like like tanned hides,
with organic, biomorphic earth patterns, earth-stained and recorded
by this artist-lover of the landscape, making her tribute to the ground
we all stand upon. For Remington it is a sacred act, this art-making.
For us it is a visual experience that connects us to each other and
to our geological present and past—it is sensual and most of all,
real.
Remington's friend the writer, Silver Stanfill expresses the profundity
of this art on the artists website at www.maggieremington.com:
"Remington's earth paintings celebrate patterns of nature: river
beds or mountain ranges seen from ten miles up, a canyon's geology,
anatomy of a trout jaw, an amoeba extending a pseudopod, DNA structure.
But rather than aiming for recognition, Remington's work provokes
reflection. Instead of showing what any sojourner could see, her paintings
invite viewers to experience a response to a place. Think of Rothko
(spiritual majesty) meets O'Keefe (commitment to locality)." This
is remarkable work by a remarkable artist.
Maggie Remington
has exhibited her Earth Paintings are exhibited currently at:
Kagan &
Baron Fine Art Gallery, 443 Main Street, Montrose, CO 81401
Planet Earth
& 4 Directions, 524 Colorado Avenue, Grand Junction, CO
Natural Territory,
15816 N. Greenway Hayden Loop #300, Scottsdale, AZ 85260
Eco Connection,
1075 1/2 Main Avenue, Durango, CO 81302
Jungle Chic,
1121 Camino Del Rio, Durango, CO 81301
Habitat for
Humanity Gallery, 3000 Main Street, Durango, CO
Caole Lowry, artist and art writer, is the owner of Planet
Earth and the Four Directions Gallery, Grand Junction, Colorado.
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