“I wake up every morning with a song in my head.” – Karine Swenson
“I wake up every morning with a song in my head.” – Karine Swenson
When I paint, I always listen to music. I have been known to make up songs that I sing to my dogs when no one else is around. Music is as much a part of my life as painting is. Colors become notes. Brushstrokes keep the beat. In the studio, keeping time, spending time, time fades away while I delve inwards. My days are filled with quiet contemplation.
This collection of paintings is a window into my inner world. We all have a world inside us that is known to us only, when we pause to reflect and spend time alone. I retreat inside my own world particularly when the outside world seems chaotic. There, I can find harmony. There, I can find sanctuary. There, I can find myself. All of that I communicate through the act of painting.
Color has become the language of my inner sanctum. I place it into a structure that hints at the landscape and structures we live in. Rounded edges stem from round adobe corners. Vigas and latillas cross over each other the same way my brushstrokes cross over each other. However, I am not painting things one can see in the physical world. The language of abstraction is symbolic – a metaphor for ideas and feelings. Perhaps each painting is a song, a way for colors to live in harmony on the painting surface, and reflect the harmony within.
