Jean Wilkey
Jean Wilkey is an American artist based in New Mexico whose work combines objects, landscapes, animals and the figure to explore aspects of perception, identity, and our relationship to nature.
Wilkey has exhibited nationally and internationally, has been the recipient of fellowships and awards, and her work has been collected by individuals in more than a dozen countries. She recently exhibited work at Las Cruces Museum of Art, she was named the 2015 New Mexico artist of the Year by Exploring TOSCA magazine, and she placed as a finalist in The Artist’s Magazine 30th Annual competition. Her work has appeared in Southwest Art magazine, The Artist’s Magazine, and Exploring TOSCA. She is an active member of the American Women Artists and the Border Artists and teaches drawing and painting privately and at New Mexico State University.
Born in Fort Worth, Texas, Wilkey holds a Masters of Fine Arts degree in painting, a BFA in art, and a Masters in education. She traveled widely and lived in Honduras, Costa Rica, and Israel before moving to New Mexico where she lives with her husband and dogs, Schuster and Smudge.
About the work
My work is about our relationship to nature and to the world around us. In a sense, it’s about how we relate to nature as a metaphor for how we relate to ourselves.
Primarily, I paint still life and sometimes incorporate figures or landscape elements, so I spend a good deal of time in thrift shops and antique stores looking for still-life props. I’m especially partial to 1950s ceramic animals and bright, shiny things. I look for shape, texture, color, and something that ‘speaks’ to me. I like to live with the objects for a time until they tell me what they want. Then I move stuff around until I find an arrangement that feels right.
I love the immediacy of painting from life and often use a central motif. Color is a major component of the work as is the challenge of using dramatic light and shadow while maintaining a contemporary feel. I love the last stages when I paint the highlights and reflections and indicate specific textures, whether shiny, satiny, or rough.
I think of my paintings as “constructed realities”. They are painted fictions that, I hope, makes us think of fundamental truths and deeper meanings. The fabric curtains frame a space for nature as they once symbolized the sacred in Renaissance art. They divide, unify or set apart the subjects and create interior and exterior spaces, yielding potential for contemplation beyond the veil of paint itself.
Aside from the elements of nature we bring inside, such as flowers and houseplants, I use familiar manufactured or ‘fake’ nature – clean, glossy, plastic (and sometimes chocolate) versions, instead of the messy realities of the real thing. I hope that my realistically painted bunnies alongside ceramic or chocolate bunnies, give you ‘food for thought’.