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In her new show, “Botanical Art on Porcelain,” currently exhibiting in the Radio Room, Woodbury artist Joan Smith-Walleck marks her debut at the Good News Cafe & Gallery. In her artist’s statement, Smith-Walleck describes her porcelain works of botanical art — an ancient form of artistic expression dating back to early civilizations in Sumaria, Egypt and Greece — as “my passion.”
“Botanical art has a long history: woodcuts of herbs of medieval times, early lithographs of flowers from world explorers, Pierre Redoute’s watercolors of roses and fruits,” she observes. “Painting with metallic oxides on the durable medium of porcelain has a long history as well: ancient oriental styles, miniature portraits, detailed florals and insects, as in Dresden works.
“I began using this medium more than 40 years ago,” she notes. “The hard glaze surface is a challenge to master with oil-based paints; the metallic oxide paints also are a challenge as they may change, fade or disappear in the kiln. When the kiln is opened, occasionally there is a surprise — a piece has sagged or broken. I enjoy overcoming these obstacles as I have learned to be proficient with the medium.”
Smith-Walleck’s signature works feature wildflowers, mushrooms, fruits, vegetables and ferns, with a particular preference for the less common species of the plant world. The works typically offer realistic representations of nature painted from life when possible, often re-created from drawings done during pursuit of her avocations of hiking, camping and gardening.
“My subjects are presented in full color on a stark background in a natural wood frame with no glass,” she says. “The durable porcelain surface doesn’t require the protection of glass in the frame. A viewer may touch to feel the texture without fear. Seeing and sharing these painted portraits gives me immeasurable satisfaction,”
Smith-Walleck opened her first studio in Pittsburgh (Pa.) in 1979, and began work at her present studio in Woodbury in 1992. The subjects of her works are painted with metallic oxides in an oil base onto a porcelain tile, plate, trivet or serving piece, then fired in a kiln at temperatures near 1,400 degrees to fuse the colors into the glaze.
She has visited leading porcelain factories and collections across Europe, and has trained with noted artists in workshops and private studies in Europe and the United States. She began to develop her personal botanical-art style through private instruction with a Dresden-based painter, and later studied with the noted American botanical artists Redenta Soprano at the Bartlett Arboretum in Stamford and Anne Ophelia Dowden at the New York Botanical Garden. She currently works with Banjie Nicholas and Betsy Rogers-Knox, certified by the New York Botanical Garden in the field of botanical art.
Smith-Walleck has previously shown her works at the Boehringer Ingelheim Regional Hospice art show, the White Memorial Conservation Center in Litchfield, and the Bartlett Arboretum in Stamford. She holds frequent demonstrations as well as group and individual classes at her Woodbury studio, Heritage Village in Southbury, the Brookfield Craft Center and other locations in Connecticut.
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