Christina Major

Oil on Canvas of Sophia Loren’s Eye

2022

As an undergraduate Christina Major developed into a portrait painter. Major has been interested in the ways the identity of both artist and subject can coexist in a portrait. Major ...

Quotes within painting are in images handwritten by artist As an undergraduate Christina Major developed into a portrait painter. Major has been interested in the ways the identity...

"In the series “This is a real place!” I was fascinated by how the underside of the pier at Saint Simons Island, GA was like a readymade collage. The way the pilings and rails divide and frame the spaces between them looks artificially imposed on the scene until you notice the way the waves bounce off the pilings and the railings cast shadows on the water. In some iterations, I chose to simplify the structures of the pier and lighten the values so that it would emphasize the detail in the water. Likewise, I omitted a family of starlings and their droppings in favor of highlighting the geometry of the architecture and the colors and patterns of the water. Making paintings in a series allows me to investigate the results of making different decisions about an image. How I crop or stylize it, the manner in which I apply the paint, what gets included or excluded all add shades of meaning to each piece. Additionally, depictions of the same subject in different weather, seasons, times of day, and tides allows me a deeper understanding. I notice more relationships, colors, and details every time I paint the subject. Every painting is a pile of decisions. Playing with removing more and more details to see what is truly important sometimes improves the painting. The fewer elements you include in an image, the more each one means, and the more important it is to get each thing perfect. At times I like to paint every single detail I can find in a scene, and other times I feel like the unadorned components are sufficient to hold each other in a satisfying composition. I often add simplified shapes to my paintings to highlight the presence of absence or to heighten the importance of each area by creating stark visual contrasts. ⁠The physicality of the paint also plays a role. I used highly textured, thickly applied paint to construct the solid structural elements, and luminous layers of thinly glazed paint for the delicate linework and subtle blending of the water." - Brooke Lanier...

The painting depicts an orange/red toned rug centered on a bright blue background with a small image peaking out from underneath the rug. The small photograph has a gold ring set on top of it and includes a date written on the bottom (December 20th, 1979). Signed and dated by the artist in the bottom left corner and currently displayed in a wood frame with gold accents. Dimensions Without Frame: H 38 in. x W 32 in. Artist Biography: John Fincher...