Inquiry into Natural Color

This series is only the beginning of an inquiry into the capabilities and limitations of natural, earth-harvested color. I am extremely fascinated by the harmonious relationship between color that can be extracted from the natural world. The ground of the paintings are natural fabrics - cotton and linen. Each fabric is immersion dyed with weld, iron, tannin, madder, and brazilwood. In the center of each square is another square, painted with handmade oil paint. The paint is made through a process of pigment extraction from a natural dye bath. The pigment is isolated, dried, and ground to a fine powder, which, when combined with linseed oil and mulled by hand, becomes oil paint. I plan to continue this minimalist series, and also expand the ideas and processes into paintings made with colors of specific regions, imbuing the work with a grounded sense of color.

Each painting measures 11.5” x 11.5”