|
Printed From Acorn-Online.com Arts & Leisure
by FRAN SIKORSKI After spending much of her early career studying, writing about and curating art, Natasha Karpinskaia, with no formal art training, began painting eight years ago, achieving critical praise for her monoprints and abstract paintings. The artist, who is from Russia, has been featured in 12 solo shows, including one at Gallery A3 in Moscow, and 18 juried group shows. Her work is represented in private collections in Brussels, Paris, Moscow, California, Stamford, Rowayton, New Canaan and Wilton. In 2004, the artist was a recipient of a fellowship from the Connecticut Commission on the Arts. In 2006, the artist exhibited her complex abstract monoprints, rich with layers of color and texture, at the Ridgefield Guild of Artists Gallery in a two-person exhibit with sculptor Mary Bailey of Redding who works with basswood, maple, cherry and poplar. The two artists agreed the show “worked perfectly putting our pieces together.” After receiving a master’s degree in linguistics in Russia, Ms. Karpinskaia took a job as a junior curator at the Tretyakov Gallery, one of the largest art museums in Russia. Following receipt of a second master’s degree from the St. Petersburg Academy of Fine Arts, in 2000, she was awarded a fellowship from Columbia University in New York City to pursue her doctorate in art history. During an interview, the artist said she “did paint a little early in my career before I began curating, but nothing very serious, so when I decided to return to painting, I took classes and started with still lifes in my basement.” Ms. Karpinskaia credits her mentor, Constance Kiermaier of Westport, whose encouragement inspired her to develop her own individual style to start doing more. “She’s the kind of teacher who doesn’t make you do what she does, but instead, develops each person’s individual style, and that was the luckiest thing in the world for me because things started to happen very fast,” said the artist. She describes her art career as “in transition now,” following the deaths of her husband and father within weeks of each other.
“I went to India for several months after my husband died and volunteered to teach art to children in Kerala. I’ve never seen such poverty, and there were no art supplies for the children. I did this for me. It was a healing experience, and one of the smartest things I’ve ever done in my life, and it helped me,” she said. Another recent source of enjoyment was “seeing a lot of interesting artists emerging at art shows during a recent trip to art events in Miami.” Now living in an ArtSpace complex in downtown Bridgeport, Natasha Karpinskaia said. “I go to New York as often as I can, and when I see the art in Chelsea galleries, I wonder what’s going on with the kind of art that’s in your face and offensive. Art has to have esthetic qualities,” she said, “and what I’m seeing is ugliness.” “My art history background is my training as an artist, and I love the basic qualities of art making. I like real abstraction, and I like my work to have an abstract contact,” said Ms. Karpinskaia. Her affiliations include Silvermine Guild of Art, Loft Artists Association in Stamford, and the Center for Contemporary Printmaking in Norwalk. She is represented by Art4Love Web Gallery and Artists’ Space in New York City. To view the artist’s images from past shows, visit natashakarpinskaia.30art.com. Ms. Karpinskaia recently curated a group show, Dance Concepts, at Chi Center, a new gallery in Westport on the third floor above Banana Republic at 44 Main Street. Among the artists exhibiting work is Cate Leach of Darien, who was a ballet dancer in the New York City Ballet under George Balanchine. © Copyright 2008 by Hersam Acorn Newspapers |
