Marsello, Pat

I have been a working artist since 1979, painting on clay, silk, paper and canvas. After studying with 3 artists in this country, I traveled to China to study landscape. Upon returning I began to teach brushwork. Over the years, I have been in multiple galleries and fine art festivals around the country. 5 years ago, I began to include color in my work as well as moving into acrylic paints and watercolor. But the techniques I learned with Asian Brushwork still apply to whatever medium I am using. For me the art of brushwork is comprised of three elements. The brush is a magician’s wand, and if handled correctly, will create a world out of thin air. The paint is the blood; it holds the possibility of Ch’I yun, the living spirit of a painting. And the paper is the skin, the texture that accepts the paint and absorbs the energy of the brush. It is the dance between these three, the brush, the paint and the paper, guided by the hand that turns a blank space into a painting; one with life and movement and potential.

It is these ideas that guide my hand, but nature is what guides my heart. My subjects are elemental; sky, rock, water, plants and creatures. And in my approach to them, I try to reduce my subject down to its simplest form, using mindful strokes, efficient, but never lacking, deliberate, yet also spontaneous. For in that simplicity is the beauty of its essence.