Jan Blencowe on Roots and Influences

How did you get started?

The large box of Cray­olas with the sharp­ener in the back and my farm set were my two favorite child­hood pos­ses­sions. Draw­ing, paint­ing and cre­at­ing all kinds of things has always been an impor­tant means of expres­sion for me. I took every art class avail­able and in high school I had inde­pen­dent stud­ies in paint­ing where I was intro­duced to abstract expres­sion­ism.  I stud­ied fine art at Cald­well Col­lege, NJ and grad­u­ated with my BFA in 1984.  My most influ­en­tial men­tor though has been Mother Nature. Paint­ing the land­scape out­doors year round for a decade has taught me invalu­able lessons about beauty, nature, life and spirituality.

What is your artis­tic vision?

In my mind’s eye there are lovely visions of light and peace. These scenes of untouched nature imbued with a spir­i­tual light find there way onto the can­vas. The elu­sive mys­tery of light is my favorite sub­ject. Sun­light, ordi­nary and yet extra­or­di­nary, shapes my paint­ings. The evoca­tive half-light of sun­set, twi­light, and dawn trans­port the viewer to realms beyond the vis­i­ble. Whether painted on loca­tion or in the stu­dio these land­scapes go beyond mere rep­re­sen­ta­tion and impres­sion and delve into the deeper streams and spir­i­tual pulse that sus­tains all things.

The can­vas is both a win­dow and a mir­ror for me. Through the win­dow of the  can­vas I cre­ate a poetic and ele­gant vision of nature. Lumi­nos­ity and veils of translu­cent color invite quiet con­tem­pla­tion. Each paint­ing is also a mir­ror reflect­ing joy and cel­e­bra­tion, a visual son­net of beauty and grace, a jour­ney for the soul, a land­scape illu­mi­nat­ing the long­ing of the heart.

I focus on soft edges, rich tex­tures and evoca­tive light that reach in to cre­ate peace of mind and heart. Through the har­mo­niza­tion of color, shape and tone par­adise is not lost but remem­bered, hoped for, real­ized on the can­vas and res­ur­rected in our mind.

Describe your devel­op­ment as an artist.

My artis­tic devel­op­ment has been more of a cir­cle. Like most artists my train­ing began by learn­ing to draw. When I was learn­ing to draw, I didn’t value it as much as I should have and I couldn’t wait to get to paint­ing and all those juicy col­ors. Now, I love to sketch and draw and fill sketch books by the dozens. Though, truth to tell, my draw­ings are always in color!

I began by learn­ing to paint a real­is­tic still life. Once I could ren­der a decent like­ness I moved on.  My body of work from 25 years ago was in a style sim­i­lar to post-impressionism. It incor­po­rated a flat­tened pic­ture plane, a heavy empha­sis on design, large blocks of color and line.

When I began paint­ing out­doors I kept that style for a while, flat­ten­ing and abstract­ing what I saw and push­ing the color. Very quickly I became enchanted by nature and was under her spell. My quest for an expres­sive but more real­is­tic style was under­way. Plein air paint­ing allowed me to keep the sim­plic­ity of large shapes while adding a real­is­tic com­po­nent to my paint­ings.  It  taught me to use value struc­ture to sup­port color, to cre­ate more sub­tle sophis­ti­cated color mixes, to cre­ate believ­able dis­tance  and most impor­tantly it showed my the impor­tance of light. I was “paint­ing the day” right there in the field, on location.

After years of only paint­ing land­scapes out­doors I began to return to the stu­dio. I started by doing a paint­ing a day. These were small still life paint­ings no larger than 6x8 in. The focus was on real­ism and econ­omy of brush­work.  So I found myself back at the begin­ning again work­ing on still life.

Mean­while, my land­scapes were going through a tran­si­tional period. Paint­ing the day was no longer sat­is­fy­ing. Years of qui­etly observ­ing nature and inter­act­ing with her through the act of paint­ing etched a deep pat­tern of rev­er­ence and spir­i­tu­al­ity into my soul.  I wanted to trans­late into paint­ings my expe­ri­ence of nature as a sacred place. The qual­ity and sym­bol­ism of light became of para­mount impor­tance. To achieve this serene, sub­lime qual­ity of light I switched from oils to acrylics and from direct alla prima paint­ing meth­ods to indi­rect paint­ing meth­ods like start­ing with an impri­matura and using many lay­ers of glaz­ing and scum­bling, to get the emo­tional and psy­cho­log­i­cal effects I need to con­vey that sen­sa­tion of oth­er­worldly peace and tranquility.

Who and what influ­enced you the most in devel­op­ing your vision and voice?

Land­scape paint­ing has a long and robust his­tory within the visual arts and there are some artists and move­ments of art that have shaped and inspired me more than others.

For the sheer sen­si­tiv­ity and beauty of an artist’s vision and soul there is Van Gogh. Although I don’t paint any­thing like his style it is his inner being illu­mi­nated by both his paint­ings and his let­ters that influ­ences and inspires me on an emo­tional and psy­cho­log­i­cal level.

Land­scape painters like Corot, Turner, Con­sta­ble, the Bar­bi­zon School, the Tonal­ist move­ment, George Inness, the Hud­son River school as well as the Lumin­ists who came a gen­er­a­tion or two later, have had an enor­mous influ­ence on my devel­op­ment as a land­scape painter. Poets like Emily Dick­in­son, Emer­son, Wordsworth, Walt Whit­man and Carl Sand­burg have also had a tremen­dous influ­ence on me espe­cially in terms of shap­ing my deep love and appre­ci­a­tion of nature.

Paint­ing out­doors, en plein air, has been the most influ­en­tial expe­ri­ence in shap­ing my vision and visual voice. Time spent qui­etly observ­ing nature, learn­ing from her, tun­ing into her rhythms and cycles has allowed me to move from “paint­ing the day” to “paint­ing the poetry” and in so doing I’ve begun to find my authen­tic voice.

Where to find Jan

Web Site

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Exhibits

• 2008 Gallery at 85 Main Street, For the Love of Art-group show
• Friends & Co.- Land­scapes of Peace – solo show
• 2007 Gallery at 85 Main Street, A Dif­fer­ent View– group show
• Gallery at 85 Main Street, A Visual Edi­ble Feast– group show
• Gallery at 85 Main Street, Trea­sures Great and Small– group show
• 2007 Scheld Farm Gallery- group show
• 2007 Gallery at 85 Main Street A Year at Ham­monas­set – solo show
• 2007 Face Arts Music Gallery Spring Fling: glo­ri­ous paint­ings that cel­e­brate spring- Solo Show
• 2006 Tracy Art Cen­ter Recent New Eng­land Works: Jan Blencowe & Jay Folger
• 2006 The Art Bin, Madi­son, CT
• 2005 Solo Show Paint­ing the Town, Lib­erty Bank
• 2005 Tracy Art Cen­ter Fac­ulty Show
• 2005 Bran­ford Art Stu­dio Fac­ulty Show
• 2005 Brick Gallery Fea­tured Artist
• 2005 Hart­ford Fine Art, Con­necti­cut Plein Air Painters Group Show
• 2005 Local Artists at Malone’s
• 2003 Madi­son Town Hall Selected Artists Group Show