ARTIST STATEMENTS
Precious Substratum
Lea Friesen, Mary Rose, Summer Scharringhausen
Lea Friesen | Artist Statement
“to carry painting beyond the appearance
of the physical world, through new concepts of space, color, light and design,
to imaginative realms that are idealistic and spiritual.”
-Transcendental Painting Group statement of purpose, 1938
My goal in making art is to continue the work of spiritual transcendentalist artists who have come before me. The statement above by the Transcendental Painting Group which included Agnes Pelton, exemplifies this partnership between the formal elements of art and the intention to conceptualize the divine.
I have made art for most of my life. The struggle to understand the eclectic variety of subjects in my artwork was a theme of life after graduate school. However, an interest in taking common elements of the physical world and finding new ways to look at them was common in my work.
In 2020 I turned toward a focus on wellbeing both for myself and my career through graduate work in holistic health. This changed my relationship with artmaking by allowing me to orient myself in a different direction. In keeping integration of my own spirit, body and mind forefront, I have been able to relax the pressure that kept my work from cohering for many years.
Mary Rose | Artist Statement
I create dark, fairy-tale-themed artwork that blends botanical and anatomical subjects. I keep returning to this imagery because I am fascinated by the beautiful, often unsettling cycles of growth, decay, and symbiosis. I use thousands of stippled ink dots and watercolor washes, a slow and deliberate process that mirrors the gradual, quiet pace of nature taking over. I want my work to show people that there is magic and beauty to be found even in decay.
Summer Scharringhausen | Artist Statement
“The pond built my muscles, wove my baskets, mulched my garden, made my tea, and trellised my Morning Glories. Our lives became entwined in ways both material and spiritual. It's been a balanced exchange. I worked on the pond, and the pond worked on me, and together we made a good home.” - Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass.
This series of artwork is inspired by nature, human impact, and the symbiotic relationships between it all. It is about the homes that we and other creatures create for ourselves, the seeds that we plant, the sense of being rooted in community and to the land. We are all connected… to our neighbors, to our families, to the earth, called to protect and love one another.
About the Artist
Summer Scharringhausen is a mixed-media artist, a person who believes in the power of art and peace, a wife and a mother, a person who experiences God in nature. Summer taught visual arts in public schools for more than ten years, has worked in arts management for more than ten years, and has been creating art for more than 25 years. Her previous solo-exhibitions include Kenosha Creative Space and MacRostie Art Center. Her work was featured in the South Shore Arts “Art in Focus” online presentation series, in several group exhibitions at Altered Esthetics in Minneapolis, and shown throughout the United States as part of the Billboard Art Project, with the artist collaborative “Happy Accidents”.