Touching Essence. Kindling Resonance.
AnneKarin Glass is an award-winning international artist whose original fine art drawings and oil paintings explore the beauty of form, emotion, and imagination. Her work spans elegant figurative studies, expressive still life, evocative landscapes, and abstract compositions — collected by private and corporate art lovers across North America, Asia, and Europe.
Abstract
Images abstracted from reality or purely imagined in the artist's mind's eye.
The abstract is what it all boils down to—space, light, volume, shape, line, and color. These are the elements of what we see in the world around us—not that these elements are even real in the real world (there are no lines between objects in reality). It’s a matter of how I organize it all in two dimensions—into an image the brain might recognize or not.
I enjoy painting abstract because I am completely free to use my skills, developed over 40+ years, to invent, explore, and juxtapose all these visual elements to create an emotional, sensual, joyous, and dynamic experience for my viewers. Enjoy!!!
Gestures
For these gesture paintings, the model poses for four minutes and then changes the pose. I connect viscerally with the model — I work fast — no time for thinking or planning. Not all gesture paintings are successful.
A group of figurative oil paintings on paper, each painted by a live model posing for four minutes. I use a dripping wet brush containing more solvent than pigment to “feel” the figure and transfer her to the paper. I finish using a palette knife, defining her shape and volume — the space she occupies in her pose. Gesture painting is a fun, sensual, emotional experience. My hope is that you, the viewer, experience the joy, emotion, and sensuality I felt painting them.
A group of figurative oil paintings on a 60” canvas, each painted from a live model. I first texture the canvas with a thick layer of gesso and let it dry. I then use a dripping wet brush containing more solvent than pigment to “feel” the figure and transfer her to the canvas, applying many layers of paint. I finish using a palette knife, further defining her shape and volume — the space she occupies in her pose. Gesture painting is a fun, sensual, and emotional experience. My hope is that you, the viewer, experience the joy, emotion, and sensuality I felt painting them.
Figures
The Figures shows images in oil/canvas of nude male and female models of varying ethnicity in a variety of poses.
A group of figurative oil paintings on canvas, each painted from a live model posing for seven and a half hours in three separate sittings.
To start, I use a wet brush containing more solvent than pigment to “feel” the figure and position her on the canvas, to establish the composition of the painting—before I begin, I set the idea of my destination. This first step is the most essential step in creating a successful painting.
Next, I build. I explore the possibilities of light and shadow and alter features of the model and setting as necessary while I build up the surface of the canvas. The last step is color and contrast.
Painting the figure is a fun, sensual, and emotional experience. My hope is that you, the viewer, experience the joy, emotion, and sensuality I felt painting them.
Still Life
Images of fruits, flowers, table settings, shoes, and objects in arranged or natural settings.
Things I find funny, or beautiful, or charming, or challenging to execute. I work from my own photos, or from things in my surroundings; sometimes my imagination takes control, inventing and arranging real and surreal shapes.
Painting still lifes is a fun, sensual, and emotional experience. My hope is that you, the viewer, experience the joy, emotion, and sensuality I felt painting them.
Stories
Narrative paintings suggest a story or pose a mystery for the viewer to untangle.
Things I find ridiculous, or beautiful, or charming, or mystifying. Things that tickle my fancy, piss me off or scare the hell out of me. Sometimes I work from photos, mostly mine, not always. Or from memories, lessons learned or not; sometimes my imagination takes control, inventing and arranging real and surreal images. I just need to put these stories into pictures—into paint. Painting stories is a fun, sensual, and emotional experience.
My hope is that you, the viewer, experience the joy, emotion, and sensuality I felt painting them.
Places
Places include realistic and abstract images of landscapes, cityscapes, interiors and imagined places.
No fixed rules when it comes to landscapes and interiors. Many are inspired by photographs, mostly mine. So, I feel free to choose and change elements in the picture. I reposition, enlarge or reduce, reshape, recolor them, creating a new harmony. Occasionally, I completely invent the image—making an imaginary place, sometimes surreal. Painting locations is a fun, sensual, and emotional experience.
My hope is that you, the viewer, also experience the joy, emotion, and sensuality I felt painting them.
Masks
As a child I was fascinated by African masks. I saw them in the Field Museum and the Art Institute of Chicago, where I took summer classes during grade school and high school. I also collected jazz and blues music. No one had to tell me, “Black is beautiful.” That was obvious.
It’s not surprising then that I eventually felt the need to express my appreciation for Afro-culture artistically. The mystery and beauty of African masks made them an excellent vehicle for that exploration. In African culture, the mask—in ritual practice—serves the wearer and the community. It is used to celebrate life’s transitions, to heal, and to offer gratitude to the spirits. It connects the people with the spirit world, with the unseen but profoundly felt power that touches all life.
During the ritual, the mask wearer becomes the entity represented by the mask—a transcendent and transubstantive experience for the wearer and the group. Did the spirit of the masks inhabit me as I selected and painted them? I don’t know. But their visual impact and the feeling they emanate determined my choices. I pulled eleven from over 150 images collected during museum visits and online research.
For me, painting each mask was an artistic challenge that stimulated new creative directions in composition, color, and brushwork. I hope you enjoy the singular mystery of each of these African masks. Painting these masks was a deep, sensual, and emotional experience. My hope is that you, the viewer, experience the joy, emotion, and sensuality I felt painting them.
Umbrellas
I like umbrellas. I like their shapes, the way they look in a group — everyone opens one when it's raining or when the sun is hot. Besides their visual interest, I like their protection from the elements. So I keep coming back to them.
