About Cathy Carey
• New! Sketchbook Watercolors
• Thumbnail Gallery
• Maui
• Santa Fe, NM
• Arizona
• California Dream Series
• Tuscany, Italy
• Venice, Italy
• The Devonian Desert
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Hand Made Journals
Gaia Earth Shrines
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Articles by Cathy Carey
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• San Diego, CA
• Santa Fe, NM
• Pasadena, CA
The Glasshouse Studio Classes
• Color
Theory and Impressionist Landscape Painting
Private Lessons
The Philosophy of Color Workbook
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Contact
Cathy Carey to Register
Phone: 760-489-9109
Fax: 760-489-9149
Email: cathy@artstudiosandiego.com
Located in Southwest Escondido near Del Dios Highway and Via Rancho
Parkway
One of my favorite quotes on painting is from Oscar Wilde’s Picture of Dorian Gray: “...every portrait that is painted with feeling is a portrait of the artist, not of the sitter. The sitter is merely the accident, the occasion. It is not he who is revealed by the painter; it is rather the painter who, on the colored canvas reveals himself.”
The Style
I am often asked what my style of painting is called. I employ impressionist techniques, expressionist color and a sense of emotion that colors the reality of the moment. My purpose is to capture a sense of magic about reality by describing the color and drama of a story in the same way as a fairy tale. I want my pictures to transcend the reality of description and instead create archetypal symbols of the beauty of an examined moment.I call my style Magic Realism.
The Technique
I enjoy working in a series. I go to a place, take photos, paint on location, write thoughts and words about how the place “feels” to me. Each new subject requires me to re-evaluate the way I apply the paint to the surface, and which medium I should use. I try and combine the best of studio painting and plein air, by using the complex color nuances of nature as well as the heightened color that comes by painting from memory. I am driven to enhance the color of the scene in order to express my emotional memories of the moment. I am drawn to images of fleeting moments, the patterns and textures of light, the illumination of objects. Something about a scene I choose to paint is at once compelling to me and part of an everyday encounter.
My foremost interest in painting is the effective use of color in creating emotional and visual depth. When people look at my paintings, I think the first thing they notice is the vibrant color. I’m not even sure I see color in the same way as everyone else. Does everyone perceive the world in terms of the language of color? It’s a wonderful paradox to ponder - what color do you “see”, what color do I “see”, what color is “real”?The Philosophy
My personal philosophy of color is to express emotional meaning through color. I believe this is the purpose of art, to express the story of being alive at a particular time. Art is the physical manifestation of the emotional and spiritual nature of an artist’s response to the world around them, and the world within them.
Throughout the years I’ve worked in all media and I’ve researched and studied the many ways color is used to express emotion, perspective, and temperature. From my research I teach classes on Color Theory and wrote a workbook for my students called ‘The Philosophy of Color’, published in 2004.The Background
I was born in Washington, DC. and educated at the Corcoran School of Art in Washington DC, I received a BFA in Painting and Printmaking from Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, Virginia. I have exhibited my paintings in galleries in Virginia and California, and my paintings are in many private collections. I teach classes and workshops in Santa Fe, NM, Pasadena, CA, at the Golden Door, Escondido, CA and at my studio in Escondido, CA .
In 2004, I was honored with inclusion in the Who’s Who in the World as well as Who’s Who in America in 2003 and 2004. I was selected to be an International Visual Artist of the Year in Contemporary Art for 2004 by the International Biographical Centre, Cambridge, England.
