Deborah Webster
I am fascinated by how memories affect our thoughts and emotional responses. My work explores the psychological space between ideas and memory. I consider each piece to be a fragment of thought – energetically connected, disconnected, entangled, and attached to other thoughts and emotions.
Using multiple layers of various materials to express the complex thought-memory connection, I combine delicate handmade papers, rich oil pigments, and glass beads. As I work with these materials, I focus on the ways patterns interact throughout the layering process until suddenly the image in front of me comes to life. My thinking now has visual form. The result is a richly textured and layered surface that symbolizes the way in which our thoughts, memories and emotions are connected and intertwined through energy networks.
This body of work was inspired by my recent adventures in Australia. I found myself mesmerized by the unfamiliarity of the natural world. It’s a magical land of opposites….Life and the landscape are layered with history, emotion, dreams, and memories…. The multiple layers in my work combined with swirling, concentric lines speak to the physical and spiritual movement across the landscape of my experience.
DEBORAH WEBSTERworks as an art educator at Sayles School of Fine Arts at Schenectady High School. Her work embodies the unique patterns of thought and energy systems we create in relationships with one another. The last two decades have been spent exploring relationships through narrative images and more recently in abstract form with mixed media.
Deborah's undergraduate training focused on psychology and art. She holds a master's degree in painting and has received various grants and awards for arts-in-education programs she has developed. She was the recipient of an NEA sponsored residency at the Art Institute of Chicago for the past two summers and last year, Deborah was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship to study aboriginal art as she traveled through Australia.
Her work has been exhibited in several solo shows as well as numerous juried and invitational exhibits in local and national galleries. In 2002, Deborah was the subject of a PBS documentary, "Horses: Saratoga Style". She lived in Hawaii for several years as an artist-in-residence both at the Kalani Honua Cultural Center on the Big Island and the Keapana Center in Kauai. Her adventures and experiences in Hawaii and, most recently in Australia, serve as the inspiration for her work.
|
