"It is not enough to simply observe the figure; I understand myself through the act of painting the figure’s emotions. As a child I often observed the subtle shifts in mood of those around me and this observation of others has continued to inspire my work today. There’s something magical in witnessing the humanness of people as they turn inward; reflectively and privately. I feel their vulnerability. The figures in my work are involved in familiar daily tasks and it is within the mundane that the mind can wander. As humans we tend to float within the horizons of our outside world and the private inner world; I paint the feelings that come with being softly tethered to our core. I allow the feelings of the subject to guide me. Hot and cool hues are layered in oil impasto and transparent passages; often using the palette knife, oil pastel and sometimes graphite stick. Each painting is a culmination of all that is a personal statement of the moment.

As a student I came across a David Park painting and was hit with my own emotional memories. It was The Bathers and I saw my mother at the clothesline and observed her drift away. I felt her need to escape and my own feelings of being left behind. I found my personal voice that day." 

- Linda Christensen

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