c h r i s   h a r p e r   t r i p l e t t

My body of work focuses on the everyday rural life of cowgirls, farms, and country households. The impetus for my content is the close ties I have with rural Colorado. My parents were farmers who struggled all their life to raise four children and two siblings.  We lived a bucolic life, often moving between the country and town. They worked hard at many different jobs in farming, trucking, and bakeries.  My work helps piece together my pastoral history and connect with the parts I miss so much.  My work gives me an excuse to be around these people and places I'm most comfortable with and allows me to re-enter that world for a few rare moments and capture that emotion in my paintings.

 

I'm a mixed media artist, mainly working in watercolor from my photographs by planning out the canvas, investigating the detail, and breaking apart the scenes by manipulating them first with computer techniques to reposition the elements or transform the image through filters. I experiment with the layout and color and technique by constructing small practice drawings and paintings, which sometimes become the finished piece. When I work in watercolor and ink, I try to capture surprising details in a common subject. When working in acrylic or oil, I build layers of texture and paint expressionistic images with exaggerated color. The challenge and encompassing feeling of working with a large surface is where I'm most comfortable.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           ~ Feb 2023