Janet Pearlman Paintings

Artist Statement 2012

I paint from hidden sources, looking into crusty texture, glimpsing images. The direction of the movement often comes first, and then I check my mood to choose the colors. The images are offered by an unseen hand. In these works expression of feeling is central, commemorating a world inside.  A drama plays out: the lessons of living are marked with arm movements and paint on the canvas. In the midst of creation I may grieve in a short burst and at times I let go of a whole section of what is painted—it no longer works for this piece—and I see in that moment, not for my life either.

The application of the texture to the canvases was inspired by the cave wall paintings of 30,000 years ago at Chauvet Cave in France. When I viewed those images in the mid 1990’s I was deeply moved. My work connects to that early human whose marks that had such vitality that today’s viewer sees images so fresh they look like they were painted in recent months, not eons ago. I aspire to offer a taste of the connection to wholeness like in that cave at the dawn of art.  Whispered in my ear is this: We humans are protected, doing well and have reason to celebrate.  Please savor your experience in taking in these pieces, and if so moved, email your comments to the artist’s address below.

Janet Pearlman began painting in 1977 when she was encouraged by Harry Holtzman, New York Times art critic, in a couple of serendipitous meetings.  From 1985- 1988 she  studied with Lena Marchi, abstract expressionist painter and printmaker in Massachusetts; with Lois Tarlow, painter in New England and New Mexico; at the Provincetown Art Society, Provincetown, Massachusetts; and at Massachusetts College of Art and numerous other venues.

 From 1998-2002 Janet explored the artistic approach of Rudolph Steiner with Carla Mattioli, using watercolor on wet, and continued working in watercolor for 10 years. In February 2007 she returned to acrylics painted on textured surface, and began creating the body of work that constitutes this show.  Throughout the thirty-four years of painting, she immersed herself in many and varied forms of inner development, and developed her craft through the practice of expressing this vibrant inner life with paint.

Contact Janet Pearlman at 434-823-2899 or jpearl@streamofyes.com.

To read more about Janet Pearlman Paintings, click here