Website : www.judithkruger.com

 

The Artist's Statement 

 

The production of my paintings, prints and mixed media work is driven by an unrelenting preoccupation with natural matter as “art material”. Each body of work aims to propose new ways for us to co-exist mindfully and productively with our environment, rather than destructively.

 

For over a decade I have extensively researched, taught and advocated for the materials and techniques of ancient Japanese painting practices, which employ pulverized organic and inorganic pigments mixed with specific natural glue binders. These arcane painting practices are, in simplest forms, no different than those of the prehistoric era.

 

It is the slow, mindful, scientific practice of making natural color from rocks, shells, insects and plants that first lured me in. Discourse with scientists, artists, researchers and conservators in Japan, China, India and Europe ultimately deepened my quest. Ecology and biophilia became my vantage points: abstraction my vehicle.

 

Inquiry, alchemy and internal dialogue currently guide artistic process while maintaining mantras of simplicity and complexity, pristine and decay, common and exotic, intention and chance, control and spontaneity, harmony and opposition, stillness and motion, boundary and freedom, concrete and associative, permanence and transience.

 

In the fast-paced tech-savvy era that we experience today, it is significant and paramount to hold on tight to that which is precious and not easily obtainable. This practice as a manifesto in art and life brings the greatest rewards

 

                            Judith Kruger, Visual Artist