CYNTHIA WILSON | Painting
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Q&A with Cynthia
1. What is your chosen medium?
I use acrylics primarily, but enjoy incorporating collage into the paintings.
2. How did you start your career in art?
I have a BFA with emphasis on visual design. I was in advertising for many years as an art director and as an illustrator, but decided to paint full time when I lived in Louisiana.
3. What you informs your art?
My love of nature and concern for the environment primarily. The winter views from my home give me spectacular cloud forms and color, the spring and summer give me wildflowers, and fall gives me leaves that have all kinds of symbolism for me.
4. What jobs you have worked other than as a professional artist.
All of my jobs centered around art....Illustrator at Southern Living Magazine, Art Director for numerous advertising agencies and a tv station.
5. What questions do you ask yourself when starting to work.
Mainly, I ask “what moves me” about the subject. I have to have strong emotional ties to the subject. Next, I am concerned with pushing color and composition to amplify the emotional impact. Finally, I ask myself if there is enough contrast in color, value and intensity to carry the subject.
6. Do you have a quote that’s important to you displayed in your studio? If so, what is it?
“There is no limit to the good a person can do if he or she doesn’t care who gets the credit.” A gentleman who came to my studio on the studio tour gave me this quote and I don’t know who originally said it, but think it was attributed to Ronald Reagan.
7. Which artist (Living or not) would you most like to invite for dinner? What would you serve?
Marc Chagall, and I would get a beautiful cake from Gateaux!
8. What has been your most unusual request for your art?
Last week, I got a letter from someone in the UK asking me to illustrate a postcard to send back to her. She had gotten information about me in “Who’s Who in American Art” and had written a note complete with postage paid postcard to be returned.
9. What music are you listening to these days?
Right now, I am listening to Boz Scaggs “Out of the Blues” as well as some Paul Sullivan piano music “A Visit to the Rockies”. Several years ago, I turned to Van Morrison every day for about six months while I was preparing a one person show. I never know what I want to hear until I go into my studio.
10. What is on your nightstand.
A beautiful lamp made by my friend David Voorhees and a blown glass paperweight by an artist I met in New York and lots of cat hair.
“I develop a sense of oneness with my subject that comes from being still, listening and observing. The work takes on a life of its own. It reflects my emotions, my observations and my experiences as an artist. I feel that we are losing touch with nature and maybe, through my paintings, someone might begin to see how important it is to preserve this beautiful place we inhabit. ”
About Cynthia
This Washington D.C. native and former illustrator takes her inspiration from nature. Her visual themes, rendered in acrylic, are metaphors for life as she sees it.
A recurring motif in her works, leaves floating on water symbolize the process of living and dying, decay and rebirth – the still water reflecting sky and trees, the leaves fading as they submerge, eventually slipping to the floor of the pond, recycling into sustenance for future generations of living creatures.