Denise Mortensen
Gillette, NJ
I’m an abstract expressionist painter living in New Jersey. I recently re-discovered my love for painting after a four-decade hiatus.
MessageFor the past 40 years. Denise Mortensen created and nurtured her five best works of art: her children. Along the way, she published four children’s picture books, inspired young minds as a teacher, and crafted words as an editor.
Growing up in a suburb of New York City, she was the third of seven children. Her house was a happy, boisterous place—where all manner of stray animals, people and children gravitated—and where Denise first found her love for drawing and painting.
Art was her favorite subject in high school, but after graduation, she went off to college to study journalism, then worked in New York City for CBS News and the Condé Nast Publications. In 2018, when Denise's children were grown, and her house was suddenly quiet, she began creating art again. She picked up where she left off 40 years ago, first drawing graphite portraits and re-acquainting herself with watercolors, then moving into acrylics and mixed media.
Denise has spent the past several years re-immersing herself in art theory and practice, having completed the 12-week ART2Life program, Jane Burton’s Fearless Abstraction, and numerous other art workshops. She is especially drawn to the work of Helen Frankenthaler, Willem deKooning, Richard Diebenkorn, and Claude Monet. She has exhibited at the Sturt Haaga Gallery in Los Angeles.
Denise's life revolves around family, friends, travel, gardening and art. She feels very fortunate to do what she loves every day.
Statement
I make abstract acrylic and mixed media paintings about the complex relationship between land, water and human-made forms, from an aerial perspective. Roadways and bridges, cities, rivers, lakes, forests and farms create a network of lines, shapes and colors that resemble a rich, topographic tapestry-a mosaic of human endeavor and nature's beauty. I’ve always been fascinated with air travel, having grown up under the flight path of Kennedy Airport. Those jumbo jets from faraway places made me wonder what the world must look like from high above, how modern transportation has made our world smaller and how, because of technological advancement, human connections have paradoxically become infinitely closer, while also becoming further apart. These same “pathways” I seek to explore are, on a deeper level, like the course of life, twisting and turning through mulitple peaks and valleys. As an avid gardener, I am also drawn to the vibrant colors and structures that define and support gardens. I seek to capture the geometry of forms and celebrate the vibrant patchwork that binds us together.
My work is gestural and intuitive, arising from a need to release both visceral and emotional energy while leaving space for calm. I start with a loose structure of wax pencil or charcoal to build a framework, then employ mark-making, watered down acrylics, and layers of texture to build history and interest. As the composition unfolds, these layers give way to discernment and more purposeful marks and strokes.
My art is a manifestation of my reverence for nature, my wonder for technological advancement, and my longing for pathways that ultimately lead to peace.
https://www.denisemortensenart.com/
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