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In the
studio
BY MICHELE CORRIEL
Bozeman
Daily Chronicle |
PUBLISHED BY THE BOZEMAN DAILY
CHRONICLE
AT HOME magazine
AUGUST 5, 2008
Jerolyn Dirks:
Evolution of an artist |
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Making it her own
"There are painters who
transform the sun into a yellow spot, but there are others who, thanks
to their art and intelligence, transform a yellow spot into the sun."
Pablo Picasso |
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Jerolyn Dirks paints in a century old granary, near to bursting rafters
crowded with worn cowboy boots, books, skeletal rectangular frames,
flats of paneled wood, cabinet doors, canvas, paint, old glass bottles,
a bowl of brown eggs, small field studies and large works in progress.
Her view from the small cabin/studio looks out on Ross Peak. The
Bill Smith creek rustles by, voicing overflowing water in louder than
normal tones. Outside a mule stands in the driveway, a duck
settles in the shade, as chickens do what chickens do, boisterously and
without regard.
And although Dirks has been a part of the art
community and a successful artist in her own right for nearly 20 years,
this is an exciting time. Her well-known reputation for
illustrative detail-oriented watercolors with pen and ink led her to
rethink her style and the way in which she practices art. Embarking on a
new body of work, a transformative passage she's embracing with her
whole heart, courageously stretching herself beyond her comfort, she's
exchanged her watercolors and inks for oil paint. |
Springhill Aspen |
"There's
a richness in the oils," she says, stepping to the side of a very
horizontal canvas she's in the midst of finishing. "I like the
texture i can get with both the brush and the palette knife."
A painting, not yet finished, leans against the back
wall of her studio. In this piece Dirks uses texture by working
with thick applications of paint. The colors of Ross Peak ranging
from blue-tipped white to a deep twilight blue reflect her affection for
the detail she relied on in her pen and ink drawings and her sensitivity
to watercolor hues. But there is something more - an intimacy with
the subject matter that has quietly enveloped her over the last two
decades.
"It's been a scary transition, " Dirks says. But
scary things have a certain appeal. Painting in oils is a new
process and it's more contemplative than watercolors. "One of the
things i liked about watercolor was that I was always on the verge of
disaster," Dirks says, hanging her great grandfather's cane over
the top of the canvas to rest her hand while attending to the fine
brushwork in the painting. "I found that both challenging and
interesting." |
Working in a medium where mistakes can be
reworked, where layers of paint create a deeper and more complex
language and there is the luxury of time to consider, where
you're going with a piece, has turned Dirks back into a student.
"When I went to art school at UCLA in the 1970's they
didn't teach us the basics," she says, trailing a loaded brush
along the horizon, leaving a purple line of river behind it.
Her art professor at the time was working on his own art - a
hunk of meat rotting inside a plexiglass container.
"I find that painting the landscape, outdoors, learning about
the classical approach to painting is giving me the background I
never got at school.
Landscape painter Aaron Schuerr has been mentoring
Dirks over the past few months, helping her with the shift to
oils.
"It's very brave of her," Schuerr says of her departure
from a medium that has been very lucrative for her. "I've
known Jerolyn for quite a while. She already knows what
she's doing, but making transitions...there's a lot of practical
considerations that aren't easy to pick up on your own." |
Storm over Ross Peak |
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Moonlight on the Madison |
What they usually do is go out and
paint plein air style, doing field studies and getting a
feel for putting the paint on the canvas, and Schuerr
will pass on a few practical tidbits to Dirks as they
paint.
"Most of it is stuff other artists have passed on to
me," Schuerr says. He knows what she's going
through because a few years ago he switched over from
pastels to oils. "What's nice about hanging out
with her is she's got such a strong personality and
strong stylistic impulse. I see her working
towards the directness of the landscape, specially
working on location, which has a different demand on you
than that of working in the studio. There's a
straightforwardness that the artist needs and I've been
enjoying watching her develop that."
"The key to learning a new medium is the same with
anything: practice, practice, practice." "It's
important |
not to always
think about what will sell, but to paint exercises that
have no intention of getting framed," Schuerr
says. "She's really been doing her homework and
her progress has been remarkably fast. It's been
kind of fun to watch her learn to relax about it.
What i see in her painting, the thing that's working for
her, is a strong sense of layering color and a
translucency of color. It's not just slapping down
one color but developing layers."
He likens it to the difference between a simple note
and a chord. "Some artists that transfer from
watercolor tend to be too stingy with the paint,"
Schuerr says. "What's so neat about her is that
she's been quite a student, reading, watching
instructional videos. She's got a strong
personality to bring to her work, a sensitivity to the
land and a sense of joy that comes across in her
painting."
Inside her studio a large glass-covered desk is stacked
with textbooks, about oil painting. But it's the
sounds of summer, like a gauzy curtain, that flutter
into her work. They take her back to the locations
where she was first inspired.
"The part I struggle with is do I paint what I see, as
I see it, or do I paint what it feels like?" Dirks says,
pausing with the brush in her hands, a paper towel
soaked in turpentine in the other. "While I was
painting this," she motions to Moon Light on the
Madison, the horizontal painting on her easel, "I
had my dog with me and six or seven cranes flew by
overhead. I heard the river and the sun was coming
up - I almost didn't want to paint - everything was so
perfect." |
The serenity of the painting is
apparent even if you didn't know her state of mind at
the time. The vast open field, with an
underpainting of rose and orange, suggest a place
untouched; her choice of a four-foot long canvas
reaching for the unbidden horizon, and the long stretch
of mildly purple-brown river, stable, languid, a seam
between the mountains and the plains.
"I want to know the colors and how they'll work on the
canvas so well that I can just quickly grab the right
one," she says. But as she gets fluid with her new
set of values, finding her way, each canvas adds another
refrain to her newfound voice.
Cori Koenig, owner of Hole in the Wall Gallery, in
Ennis, has been showing and selling her oil paintings
with great success. "She's growing a following of
collectors," Koenig says. "They've seen the
Madison River pieces but they're usually picked up
before they get to the gallery, so collectors are
excited and eager to see what will be in the gallery
next." |
Sunrise over Saddle Mt, Bill
Smith Creek |
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Soda Butte Creek,
Lamar Valley |
Koenig believes it's the
life in her work that people can relate to when
they're looking at Dirks' landscapes. "You
get her perspective that captures a feeling,"
she says. "Her landscapes are joyful
pieces and her florals burst with life."
For Koenig, Dirks' landscape oil paintings, compared
with her watercolors, show a sense of artistic
growth.
"Jerolyn is a hard worker and she's done a lot of
whimsical work, but lately she's matured with
her beautiful landscape pieces, vibrant colors
and a really nice impressionistic, unique style
of her own."
Dirks' transition to oils has elicited a great respect
from her fellow painters as well as her gallery.
"One of the exciting things about Jerolyn and her work
is that she is always challenging herself by
experimenting with new techniques and media
while keeping true to her fresh, unique stlye,
Koenig says. "As a gallery owner, I am
always anticipating what she'll come up with
next, as are her collectors. Jerolyn never
rests on her laurels and never fails to
pleasantly surprise all of us who keep tabs on
her work." |
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Michele Corriel is a
frequent contributor to At Home |
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Poppies
on copper leaf |
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