| Exhibition: | Audra Weaser, Elements |
| Dates: | 03 December, 2016 through 14 January, 2017 |
| Reception: | Saturday, 03 December, 2016 — 4-7 |
| Location: | Ruth Bachofner Gallery 2525 Michigan Avenue, Suite G2 Santa Monica, CA 90404 |
Ruth Bachofner Gallery is pleased to present Elements, an exhibition of new paintings by
Los Angeles-based artist Audra Weaser. There will be a reception for the artist Saturday,
December 3, 4-7 PM.
Audra Weaser's newest body of work explores the essential elements behind natural phenomena such as water and light. Throughout her career, Audra Weaser has focused on eliciting a quiet forcefulness from the elemental. From her earliest works of graphite drawings on plaster tablets, to her more recent works of nature-inspired paintings, Weaser engages a rigorous connection with her chosen medium to access the most essential part of her subject. While Weaser’s paintings read as landscapes, her approach rests in the realm of abstraction, where intuition and material process play off one another.
In her current work as with previous works, Weaser begins with the fundamental act of drawing, using her memories and experiences in nature as a reference point. As she progressively layers paint and medium onto the surface of her panels, the artist gradually obscures her loose charcoal sketches. Weaser's initial drawings are referenced only in feeling, as she gradually pulls the painting into an open-ended abstract language. As she excavates back down into the layers with a sander, she intuitively forms her compositions using long, sweeping motions. A version of the original drawing and intention emerges as a new, atmospheric composition. Flecks of light, and cascades of pigment seep through chalky white paint, suggesting a distant landscape, trees reflecting on rippling water or light striking against a frozen plane or breaking through a forest.
The paintings evoke the extraordinary and enveloping feeling of being in nature. For Weaser, there is an unpredictability about how the colors will reveal themselves, which allows for the paintings to remain expansive, alluding to the effects of light and atmosphere of a remembered place.