Please right click on the picture above, and then click on "Print Picture"

Artist statement

As a child, I grew up spending summers at my grandmother’s farm. I loved the freedom of running in the fields. As I grew up I lived in more densely populated cities: NY, London, and Seattle. When I would come home for a visit, especially after being in NY, I felt a sigh of relief. It seemed my soul needed that room to breathe. As I released my breath, I felt I was flowing out into the vast space from field to field.  My husband, who grew up in Seattle, got that same sense when he could look out onto the ocean: Freedom.

         I believe it is healing to have that visual space to look out onto. We all need it in some form. That is why I have created these paintings.

Large landscapes in the home can create a space, even larger than a window to the real outside. The large landscape can create a place for the eye to wander, a place for the mind to imagine, a place for the soul to expand.

In this show, I have one example of the final product of my vision. It is a painting of Mt. St. Helen after the eruption. Because it is so large you are faced with not being able to see it all at once, and you become engulfed by it, lost.  I made it into panels so that the viewer could use his or her imagination to fill the spaces in between. I also wanted to make an acknowledgement of Chinese landscape panels.

For practical purposes, panels lend themselves to be placed between windows or around other architectural divisions. They can be moved easily. With a room filled with these panels the person in the room will feel surrounded by a panoramic view, thus creating a space when your eye and soul can rest.

The rest of the show is filled with watercolor sketches and acrylic sketches of Ohio landscapes. I wanted to show the process of how I come from a photograph, work it out in a watercolor, move to an acrylic sketch, which is then divided into panels for a finished product of a large panel landscape. 

I envision homes owners and designers using these paintings to create sweeping visual spaces inside what could have been a limited, closed in space. I want to bring these beautiful Ohio vistas inside. I want to bring them home. 

I hope you enjoy the show and that you can dream along with me. 

Sincerely,

Anna Schroeder

Web site:      www.annartsite.com
e-mail:           anna@annartsite.com