Ann Rosmarin
Artist’s Statement
I grew up in South Africa, in a beautiful, mountainous bushveld (grassy plain) area. After graduating with a B.A. Fine Arts degree from the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, I lived in London where I taught art and travelled in Europe for several years. Later, in Cleveland, Ohio, I built a landscape design business and furthered my painting and printmaking. I came to live in Sonoma County, California in 2012 and I continue to develop my art and landscape design in this stunning area. Both these fields provide me with the opportunity of expressing who I am as an artist.
All my paintings begin with a strong drive to create a visual impression that evokes a particular mood and emotion: The fleeting, ephemeral quality of light and the physical forces of a landscape as seen from an aerial view, a seascape, the texture and colour of the walls in Tuscany, an African Sunset, mountain vineyards or a close up detail of a garden. I attempt to capture the essence of a landscape, often while travelling, and I later transform these quick sketches into a series of drawings, watercolours, intaglio prints and paintings. My paintings range in both small and large scale to best capture that elusive sense of space.
I often face a blank canvas and allow one brushstroke to generate the next. I am always aware of the challenge between the genesis of an idea and its resolution on the canvas. It’s important for me to recognize and maintain evidence of this struggle: The imperfect marks I leave behind, the pentimenti, the reworked gestures, layers, all dissolving the canvas surface in transparent light.
The forms and colours that I see in the surrounding landscapes constantly inspire me. My paintings hover in that visual field between impressionistic and the abstract. Ultimately it is in the process of painting itself that I find time to reflect. The immediacy of the image takes on a life of its own and I invite the spectator to take this journey with me.