New Forms: The Art Portfolio of Ashleigh Bartlett
Island Time, watercolour on cut silk suspended from bamboo
Ashleigh Bartlett is an abstract artist and painter based in Calgary, Alberta. In her art portfolio, Ashleigh pushes the envelope of painting, exploring new forms outside of the traditional rectangular, stretched-canvas model.
Shade Pockets, watercolour on cut silk over plant
In her recent series Alive with the Sun, the artist paints in watercolour on cut pieces of silk, hanging them vertically throughout a space to create an aesthetic that straddles the line between organic and man-made. Installed alongside -- and sometimes hanging from -- plants and trees, these pieces of coloured silk look less like natural forms and more like fallen detritus or perhaps the lost garments of tourists in a tropical region.
This notion of cutting and rearranging painted surfaces has appeared at other points in Ashleigh’s art practice. Her series ReddISH featured abstract canvases, painted in gauzy, pastel hues, and layered with collaged elements that both reflect and contrast their backgrounds.
