This is a survey of my work from 1981 through 2005. It is intended to demonstrate the styles, techniques and subjects of my work over this twenty-four year period. The additional work on the web site brings the span to the present. I have chosen a few select pieces from each phase or series of concentration. It is only a small representation of the amount and breadth of each endeavor. As difficult as it is to select out of hundreds of works, what I thought as good examples, avoiding picking what might be favorites, this serves to give you an idea of my path and interests.

The paintings of the early eighties show the beginning of my color journey. I intuitively mixed colors arranging them sequentially, with organic gestures in and around grids. From there I took the work off the canvas using hundreds of tree branches to build dimension. In the mid 1980’s Biomorphic forms replace the previous organic movements of the branch series with a return to oil on canvas enhanced by wax medium to build surface. A substantial built surface maintained itself in the work until the early 1990’s with my Floating Still Life paintings: explorations of organic forms in painterly space. A return to acrylic paints with the addition of black ink found me working abstractly again by 1992.

For the next decade I held interest in depicting landscape as abstraction, along with color fields as backgrounds or borders. This large body of work was also an exploration of Taoist and Buddhist ideas, and landscape as emotion.

Around 2003 there was a shift back to narrative description and botanic forms. The works were compositionally linked like “film strips” using both representation and abstraction. Also around this time saw the beginning of appropriated inclusive imagery and even a few birds.

Jennifer Bain / July 2011