Lisa Petsu
Clifton, NJ
I combine my intuitive process, emotional presence, and the language of abstraction to create a work of art that feels perfectly imperfect and vibratory.
Message
American born artist Lisa Petsu (b.1973) received her B.F.A from the School of Visual Arts, NYC (1995) and her M.F.A from Bard College, NY (1999) where she received the Elaine de Kooning Memorial Scholarship in painting. She creates idiosyncratic abstract paintings, sculpture and installation art that is highly textural, using objects and narratives from her lived experience. Her work entertains the edge between the art space of galleries and domestic architecture of personal life. Cultivating a spiritual connection to her materials Lisa considers the accumulation of color, time, and emotion in physical layers and moments of imperfect beauty on the canvas.
“The vantage of Petsu’s contentious “life of imperfection” gives rise to “ugly beauty” an intricate reality in which all things do not neatly fit” – Arlene Raven, curator
The artist combines her intuitive process, emotional presence, and the language of abstraction to create a work of art that feels perfectly imperfect, resonating with her experience in the world.
Early in her art career, she was honored as Ida Applebroog’s protégé in the show titled, “The Choice” and her work was reviewed in the New York Times and NY Arts magazine. She received an emerging artist grant from Aljira, A Center for Contemporary Art in Newark, New Jersey. Her work has been shown in various galleries and exhibitions. Lisa has been a public-school art educator for 26 years and recently became a certified yoga teacher after overcoming a serious medical condition. She is the mother of 4 children and lives in Clifton, New Jersey.
Statement
I see materials in the world – layers of paint on walls, furniture, objects, and architectural details simultaneously revealing/concealing a narrative of perfectly imperfect drips of paint, blobs of color, and various textures. The layers reveal time, intention and fragments of emotion. The objects I use are buffers between spaces - outside world/interior personal space, extensions of the painted surface – reaching into the real world. Color is as important as texture and other qualities in these materials. Color functions like the sense of smell- it triggers a memory or emotion. It registers time, place and thing. Color is a connection that percolates emotion and idea in my painting. I redigest specific color references from popular culture, nature, my surroundings, intuition and memory onto the layered painting surface – recombining domestic, architectural, personal, and art elements to arrive at something that resonates with my experience in the world.