Holly Grosvenor

from Through The Bramble (June 6-26, 2024)

Aigerim Bektayeva

Inspired by the hues and movement of light, artist Holly Grosvenor, studies and captures the luminosity of her natural environments. Grosvenor creates her work both on-site and in the studio, as she selects and magnifies fragments of natural settings to translate in oil and acrylics on her canvases. Her work is a response to her personal experiences in the natural realm, as she creates multiple “plein air” observation sketches in watercolor on site, as well as detailed photographs of the space, and returns to her studio to recreate these environments in oils and more recently, acrylics. Acrylics as a medium allowed Grosvenor to delve more deeply into the behavior of reflection and translucency on water and reflective surfaces, as it granted her more time to develop each painting and emphasize the details of the natural phenomena.

One of the most captivating elements in Grosvenor’s paintings is the sense of space and dimensionality she is able to create within the frame of her canvas. The special quality in her compositions invites her audiences to enter the painting and engage with her narrative and with the environment. Grosvenor’s special awareness could be influenced by her training in as an architect. “I attempt to capture the casual observation; to hold a passing moment of uncelebrated beauty in reflected light and changing color. I find profound pleasure in sketching on site surrounded by the rich colors of the natural environment.

Grosvenor has a B.A. in Environmental Design from Brown University and an M.A. in Architecture from Harvard University Graduate School of Design. She won Best in Show in the 2021 Water Media Spring Juried Show from the Oregon Society of Artists and first place in the Portland Rose Festival Art Show. Her exhibitions include Aqua Art Miami (Miami, FL), the Providence Art Club (Providence, RI), the Oregon Society of Artists (Portland, OR), the Portland Rose Festival (Portland, OR), and the Spring Bull Gallery (Newport, RI). She has been a practicing architect for forty years. Now retired from the profession, she lives and paints in western Massachusetts.

New Zealand-Samoan artist Jess Jacobs paints luxuriant landscapes that exalt the beauty of the Pacific region. Immersing herself in local history and her familial roots, her bond with Samoa ignites, sparked by stories of a grandmother’s childhood in Apia alongside Robert Louis Stevenson. A dedicated researcher, her passion unfurls historical colonial narratives, the impact of globalization, and the urgent reverberations of climate change in the Pacific.

Beyond artistic expression lies a deeper resonance—a poignant call to safeguard the Pacific’s intrinsic beauty and cultural legacy. Jacobs’ art embodies impermanence, celebrating resilience, regeneration, and the eternal cycle between old and new, urging observers to embrace change while preserving the essence of what defines us. “Just as the butterfly emerges from the chrysalis, sometimes we need to shed our former shell and take on a new paradigm shift,” she says. “This regeneration, growth and transformation, dark and light, new life, and death of the old is portrayed in my work and I embrace growth, beauty, life, hope, and its preservation from a feminine perspective.”

Mariana Kalacheva is a Bulgarian painter based in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Kalacheva’s paintings evoke bygone eras, fusing the decorative elegance of Art Nouveau with the fabled naivete of children’s illustrations. Women in sumptuous Renaissance dresses stroll through gardens filled with all sorts of earthly delights–fragrant lilies, majestic trees, multi-colored birds, swans, flamingos–or rest languidly in opulent interiors, with their lovers, children, or pets. The narratives are inspired by her travels and work in the gallery and yachting industries on the French Riviera, where she resided for many years, as well as her Bulgarian heritage. References to treasures spanning centuries—artifacts from the Thracians to Roman emperors–appear in her paintings as symbols of an idyllic past. Constantly experimenting, Kalacheva uses acrylic, paper collage, fabric, gels, beads, and paper mache on canvas or board. Her paintings evoke the timeless aura of an enchanted world, one where beauty, peace, and harmony prevail.