Lisa Gilley is from Mount Vernon, Washington. Now, if you’d ever happened to visit this blissful piece of American land, wandering through its valleys, forests, lakes and mountains, you would immediately recognize in Gilley’s painting the quintessence of landscape. Landscape as a word made of land and escape, because that’s what actually takes place when you look at her breathtaking views: you are absorbed into the canvas and become part of the painted mythology, a fugue of imagination. These places are idealized, blessed by an edenic, northern light. The colors are thick and generous, applied with mouthwatering brushstrokes that are not afraid to speak the language of the medium itself. There’s no attempt to mimic reality or, even more, to substitute it with an hyper-realistic representation of it. What makes Gilley’s work so special is her delicate, yet strong, approach to nature. The painting asserts itself as a painting so that the viewer enjoys a double reading: the landscape as it is, and the paint as the opulent, sensual medium that wants to be perceived as an independent matter, a basic material for creation. This is a rare accomplishment, and a sign of a skilled, sensitive genius. For these reasons we are glad to welcome Lisa Gilley in our pages. Her paintings are Extraordinart!
extraordinart.wordpress.com 