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CAROLYN COLE

Lives and works in Portland, OR, USA

SEARCH THE ARTIST ONLINE www.carolyncoleart.com

Carolyn Cole ‘s mixed media abstractions play to the
senses, the heart, and the emotions. She deploys
color, mass, composition, and line to command
attention, mesmerize, and draw us into places of her
own making. Once there, we are allowed to wander
at will, left to discover the incidents and clues she
leaves behind to tantalize, provoke and intrigue.

At first glance, Cole’s works appear to be simply
paint on canvas. A longer look reveals that they
are composed through a purposeful, multi-phased
process that includes collage, painting, and drawing.
She builds up the canvas with recycled envelopes,
creating an overall grid of vertical, horizontal, and
diagonal lines. The grid, plus the varied hues of the
papers – ivory, cream, and white – and the remnants
of writing or printing showing through, give Cole a
painting surface that is both smooth to the touch
and rich to the eye. The structure of the final work
is already invested in the prepared canvas; this
underlying architecture provides the essential
dimension, strength and balance to Cole’s work.

Cole begins to paint knowing generally how the
work will be composed, what the color palette will
be, and what sort of aesthetic challenge she intends
to set for herself based on past explorations. while
the painting process proceeds intuitively, it draws
on all of the knowledge the artist has gained from
her past work and carefully documented in daily
journals. As she builds up the surface, layering on
paint, she makes hundreds of decisions regarding
the juxtaposition of colors, their opacit y or
transparency, their size, shape, and function in the

 UNtItLeD (100716)
2007 MIxED MEDIA ON CANvAS 42x32 IN. /106x81 CM.
UNtItLeD (40803)
2008 MIxED MEDIA ON CANvAS 42x42 IN. /106x106 CM. 
UNtItLeD (60801)
2008 MIxED MEDIA ON CANvAS 38x38 IN. /96x96 CM. 
UNtItLeD (120706)
2007 MIxED MEDIA ON CANvAS 73x73 IN. /185x185 CM. 
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