ASHLEY LAFIANDRA

​

My work primarily consists of  drawing and painting, but photography also plays a significant role in my artistic process.  Oil painting and techniques rooted in tradition give me a sense of place and confidence so that I can play and modify creatively.  “Familiar, yet different” not only applies to my methods, but also my subject matter.  I paint nature, land, sky, snow, and a lot of trees …. A lot of trees!

​

Painting is a practice in my life.  I need this practice to navigate the world and my experiences.  I answer questions and sit with the unanswerable while painting.  I need to make beautiful things and spaces; I need to make sense of myself and my relationships.  Although the subjects in my work may be “landscapesque” they are packed full of contemplation and emotion.  Painting offers me a space where I can think and hopefully grow (or heal).  Currently, I am focused on ancient themes in art and philosophy such as, beauty, aging, time, death, and perspective. 

​

As I mentioned before, I appreciate and enjoy the “traditional” aspects of oil painting.  I build my surfaces and stretch either linen or canvas.  Working with wood, textiles, and gesso are as pleasurable to me as manipulating paint on the surface.  Underpaintings, linseed oil, the smell of turpentine and traditional pigments is the basis of  my approach to painting.   I play with traditional methods; honoring and challenging them to develop paintings with mood, texture, and expression.   Combining my training in traditional realism with my admiration and passion for abstraction and design I indulge in both worlds.   My work is full of dichotomy and is always somewhere on a continuum between old and young, traditional and experimental, mind and heart, yin and yang, and the “familiar and different.”