Teodora Guererra

Saltwater

2017

blue, navy, simple, aqua, clouds, sea, chic, movement, texture, atmosphere, relaxation, calm, sky, influence: Pat Steir.

BIOGRAPHY
Teodora Guererra received her Bachelor of Arts in Art Education with a minor in Studio Art from Southern Connecticut University in New Haven and a Masters in Art Education from the College of Saint Rose, Skidmore College. Her artistic vision deepened and evolved during her years spent teaching and painting in Connecticut, Tucson, Arizona, and upstate New York. Arizona’s naturally radiant landscape and arid climate led her to experiment with rich under-painting and vivid color. Inspired by the shifting seasons of Connecticut and New York, Guererra pursued layering, dripping and pouring techniques. Her distinctive painting style is an alluring synthesis of texture, mark-making, and glowing color. For a complete biography and artist statement, click here.

ARTIST STATEMENT
“These works explore the tides of joy, failure, humor, uncertainty, and the euphoria of it all. Subconsciously, the landslide is so complex that as I paint, I continue to uncover hidden layers of emotion and unexpected images. This is my personal evolution.

Upon completing my Masters, I began to make paintings using layers of paint, one color over another, sometimes adding other materials such as sand, glass, and bees wax to the paint. As I continued, I started to use different palette knives, making some of the layers very thick in areas, some scraped down to the color beneath. Then pouring thin layers of pigment mixed with turpentine to stain and drip, controlling the flow down the canvas usually from the top, using gravity.

Chance plays a role when you pour and drip paint over thick textured surfaces, merging with the paint underneath. I like layering emotive colors to achieve striking textural and dense paintings that are at times exuberant, playful and joyful, and at other moments fraught with tension and brooding. The color can be monochromatic in execution but other hues and occasionally some metallic seep through, revealing the complexities of all the multi-layers. Pushing the limits and taking risks when painting is in my DNA!”