EMILY VAN ENGEL

One of my classes this semester is having a group show this weekend. All of the works in the show are inspired by various science topics. I designed the poster for the show:

I recently had my Junior Review at school, where I presented a small body of work to three faculty members whom I hadn’t met before, and we discussed my work for half an hour. The Junior Review is designed to help me prepare for my Senior Show next year, where I will have a small gallery space in which to show a body of work for a week at school.

I was a little nervous for my Junior Review, but it ended up going really well, and I got some good feedback. They could tell where I had painted from still life and where I had painted with photo references. (Busted!) They felt that my white t-shirt painting (painted from an actual t-shirt, not a photo) was the strongest piece there, and they felt like if I continued to paint from direct observation rather than photos, my paintings would offer more of an experience to people who encountered them. We also talked about painterly style. I told them that I admired Bay Area Figurative Painters like Richard Diebenkorn, David Park and Elmer Bischoff, who painted in an abstract expressionist manner. One faculty member said she was seeing more of a realism-based style with my work.

There’s something really humbling about painting. I have ideas about how something I make is going to turn out and in what style I’ll express it, but instead something else seems to happen once I get going. After my junior review, I realize that the power in my painting comes from observing and also in dropping my attachment to how the finished piece turns out.