I am an artist. I was born an artist. I move through my days as an artist. It is my gift. It is what I am naturally no matter what my up bringing, education, or life experience has brought me. It is all I am. My paintings have their source from my presence, my center, the essence I was born with before I became influenced by parents, television, advertising, movie images.

For most of my life I didn’t give my gift very much food to grow on, only crayons (the 8 pack) until age 14, then public school tempera paint (again only the basic 8 colors). It wasn’t until college that I ever saw the inside of a real art supply store. Seeing all of the gorgeous but fearsome supplies like Dr. Martin’s Dyes, Craypas, packs of construction paper in 150 colors was far too intimidating. I couldn’t overcome my fear of possibly using them in a way that was against the rules. I couldn’t flow with the possibilities. I couldn’t just jump in and splash around. It took me years, way beyond college to grow into my artistic skin and have the confidence to use the colors and brushstrokes that had been denied escape from the Genie Bottle of my body.

Graduation from Moore College of Art was in 1971. I didn’t truly start painting again until 1999. My painting style can be described as soft, emotional, representational, romantically feminine, contemporary, political, humanitarian, and most recently abstract. The images and brush strokes are often flowing as a natural conversation between friends, and painterly as soft butter spread on luscious velvet, especially in my large series of irises. My images and brush strokes have a contemporary, modernistic feel. My “Chair Paintings” are a confluence of my original style with elements of impressionism, colors of Matisse and Gauguin. I’ve also painted a group of graphic, larger than life irises relating to the work of Georgia O’Keefe. My objective is to paint beautiful paintings that give the viewer a sense of deep satisfaction, or raise prickles. My studio is my happy place where natural light floods in and influences my views of the world both literally and metaphorically. I begin a painting with an imagined image and then proceed by memory in combination with seeing and feeling. I am in a state of concentration during my painting time. It is when I am in the deepest concentration, almost a trance, that I achieve my best work. The feeling or sensation I have when I’m painting is a charged feeling; it is what I imagine a cosmic message would feel like. The message comes flowing into my brain and travels through my head and chest and stomach and then out my arm, and hand and brush onto the canvas. It is when this level of concentration is broken that I often struggle with my brush and paint.

My favorite work is often my most recent work. WOODS II is my most recent work and I am quite excited about how these 5 paintings express the quality, the sensations that the woods that I live in, that surround my home, my studio give me, surround me, envelop me. My woods are scary, dense, smothering, extraordinarily beautiful, but the darkness can bring moments of depression, anxiety.

Being an artist has made me different from other people and it has taken me more than several adult years to grow comfortable in my state of being. Now that I’m here I revel in the way I see beauty. I’m thankful for my gifts and I wish to share my paintings with you in hope that they will be uplifting in these hard political times and in a world that still has not figured out how to put an end to war.

ARTISTS WORDS ABOUT 51 PAINTINGS

                                                                                                                  By Shary Koenig, Artist
Separating Art From Politics can’t always be achieved but gives the viewer a grateful rest when separation is successful. A Field Of Irises  gives positive sensations. Imagine walls filled with copious canvases catching your eye, drawing it into their entwining leaves.  You are entangled with beauty and respond with a slow exhale, letting go of pressure brought on the brain from living in today’s uncertainty of  equality, freedom, rights, finances, and stability of home and the future of democracy. There is a commonality in Fields Of Irises as with the music on the classical station. It’s easy for a child or adult to see the joy of painting in this series of irises, the swishing of the brush, the squishing of the paint into a recognizable form seen through my eyes of memory.
While this Field and most of my paintings are focused on art for art’s sake,  the pivotal part of my series is the women reclining, contemplating the political mayhem of human rights, equality, racism, government, corporate power, the supreme court, greed, hunger, women’s health rights, and access to education. My paintings in their totality are saying that Art can be separated from politics to give our minds rest from the daily, heavy, crucial problems, and that by taking a walk in nature, in contemplating art for art’s sake you can rest then open your mind once again to grapple with ponderous world solutions. My paintings are also saying that your thoughts and ideas matter. My thoughts and ideas matter.
When the viewer sees the section of women reclining a jolt of reasoning may take form. The viewer can take her (his) cue from this series to understand the theme of all of my paintings and that is to think and contemplate for herself and to be mindful that while the beauty of art initially gives her rest it afterwards opens her mind to the issues and solutions in this country. My art has the capacity to refresh and renew. The symbolism of the book represents the search for knowledge and the facts to use as a foundation for developing your ideas, your own solutions. The understanding that her thought process at times needs a rest and that alluring art can both please or rest the mind then open it to further thought on how to solve our problems here on earth and find a way to end war.
When the viewer has the good fortune to see the 12 months of woods hanging freeform, her eyes taking in the magnitude of my giant trunks and leaves of the forest fluttering in the breeze and the viewer is left with the delightful decision of choosing to walk through the woods first or concentrate on the beauty of the Iris collection. The illusion of woods to walk through is enhanced by hanging the 12 months of Woods from rafters, or tree branches of a live forest, raising the paintings 2ft. off the ground, and spacing them down the long center of a gallery. The height and breadth of these giant trees also give notice to all of my paintings hanging on walls. Visually the sheer size of these unstretched canvases, partially blocking your view of the rest of my paintings, or backyard adds to the excitement of discovery of the rest of the paintings.  You are very much walking through an interactive show.
When you reach the group of women each lying on a couch with a book you are presented with all of the humanitarian ideas that go unused by governments and people of power and money. The longer you gaze at this group the more you sense your own ideas of solutions for neighborhood problems, city problems, and world problems of hunger, immigration, racism, greed. You may begin to form solutions and ultimately my work could have a community changing, world changing impact.
As you move through each junction of an exhibition of my paintings you might find a single, unique painting  the result of me turning my head in a different direction long enough to get this new thought on canvas.
Covid came upon us and I produced the 10 women on couches with books. It was a tumultuous time politically. I couldn’t turn the noise down so I listened and I painted it. The two Woods series convey concepts of solitary life that was imposed on most of us during Covid. Woods I is a mind travel through month after month, an exploration of the difference between solitary life and loneliness.
Woods II, painted in a frenzy, is a continuation of life lived in the deep, dark woods. It represents both the satisfaction of uninterrupted solitude and the possibility of depression due to loneliness. The massive trees, the dense darkness lead to thoughts of our relative significance and insignificance to nature.
My paintings viewed as one continuous group can leave an impression on its visitors that they may refer to well after the paintings are removed from site. All 51 of my works should be seen together in one large group. Together and combined, the 51 works give a full statement and will have a powerful impact on the small city communities and the larger World Community. My audience will be struck with the influence that this female artist with a long life can have inwardly on one’s mind, and outwardly in art,  and on the community at large.

Shary Koenig

Contact me by email
sharyart@gmail.com

EDUCATION

Moore College of Art, Bachelor’s Degree, Philadelphia

Penland School of Crafts, North Carolina

Studio Incamminati, Philadelphia

SHOWS

Arts & Culture Member’s Show, June 2024.

I sold 1 print of yellow irises.

Two Home Gallery Shows, 2019 & 2020.

UPCOMING SHOWS

3rd Home Gallery Show, Sept. 14th., 2024. 2p - 6p.

The Art Walk at Doylestown Hospital will feature my work in June 2025.

Small Works at Phoenix Art Supply July 2024.

Small Works group show at Doylestown Hospital, Sept. 2024.

JOBS 1965 to present

Painter, Oil on Canvas, 1999 to present. 25 years.

2019 I opened a community ceramic studio in my basement, Doylestown, PA

Touring Cyclist 2012-2018, 30,000 miles

Gardener for Lambertville Hotel, 2002.

Grower for a 14 acre greenhouse, 2years,  Pipersville, PA

Owner of a Plant Shop in Zerns Farmer's Market, 2 years, Gilbertsville, PA

Hearing Officer for Montgomery County Courts, 4 years

Norristown, PA

Office work for a doctor, one week, Santa Cruz, CA

Muralist, painted 9 murals for a small hotel in San Jose, Costa Rica.

Aluminum and vinyl siding applicator's assistant, 2 years, Lake Jackson area of Texas.

Interior Designer for one year in Lake Jackson Texas.

I was one of 3 fashion designers creating a show using upholstery fabrics. The show received a few seconds of televised news coverage, Philadelphia, PA

Waitress.

Director of a craft shop on Long Bin Army Post in Vietnam for one year during the war.

Stylist for Mills Commercial Photography, 6 months, Philadelphia.

Art teacher in a Montessori School for one year, Austin Texas.

Seamstress for the couture designer, Maria Wohl, 1 summer in high school, Philadelphia, PA.

Shary Koenig. sharyart@gmail.com