Kelli Scofield to present first solo show at TASI in November
It’s always difficult finding words to describe someone else’s work to an audience. Art reviews are an imperfect science of conjecture and anticipation — a balancing act between the known and unknown and certainly a challenge between the authentic and the clichéd.
Kelli Scofield’s November show, “Equilibrium,” posits no such struggle as she presents an authentic demonstration of color, abstraction and order that will make most obsessive-compulsives squeal in delight across a spectrum of patterns and textures and sizes.
Scofield’s talents are revealed on canvases and assemblages in a way that seems like a natural, matter-of-course process — making it feel like her work has been with us all the time.
“For this show, I spent a lot of time this summer refining and exploring my techniques — I wanted to show something different,” she said. “I wanted to get away from just using brushes, so I used things like rulers and sticks and just other things to try and show some different textures.”
“Equilibrium” will be Scofield’s first solo show — and one can feel and see the emotion she has for this endeavor.
“This show is about balance for me. It’s about finding out who I am,” she said. “It’s about color and the craziness of shapes and squares. It’s about bringing order to chaos.”
Scofield said she and her husband, Ben, joked that she should call her show “Shit I Don’t Hate” because of her tendency to paint, pause and return to paint on a piece until she is feels it’s complete and she is satisfied.
Scofield is like many artists in that she is often her harshest and most demanding critic. She credits Ben as her biggest supporter because he always keeps her perspectives grounded — again, because she is always her harshest critic.
“My struggle is that I want to pick all the colors in my pieces,” she said. “I’m trying to bring order to the colors and combine with that the placement of shapes. Squares speak to me; I’m drawn to them.
“Ben doesn’t watch over my shoulder, but sometimes I’ll ask his opinion, and he’ll tell me, ‘Walk away from it.’ I have a habit of going back to pieces and doing little tweaks, and not moving on. Ben gives the point of view that helps me know I’ve done enough.”
Kelli counts many influences that contribute to her style and aesthetic — Picasso, Matisse, Gerhard Richter and Mark Bradford.
Additionally, local artist Richie Haynes — a friend and neighbor — gave her some advice she still carries with her.
“Richie told me not to think so much when I paint,” she said. “He said for me to just close my eyes sometimes and just let my work flow.”
Haynes died in November 2018, and some of Scofield’s pieces incorporate objects from the bits and parts he was known to collect.
“There are some boxes and pieces Ritchie’s wife, Stacey, let me use,” Scofield said. “I thought it would be a great way to honor him and how much he was an influence and a friend.”
She says her use of color sometimes overwhelms her, and she feels the urge to alter the pieces in one of her signature ways.
“Sometimes I just have like a ton of color, and it gets too chaotic,” she said. “I’ll decide that it doesn’t have any order, and then I always want to get white paint and bring it in. So, I was trying to get away from just doing that.”
A fan of poetry, Scofield has added little surprises throughout several of her pieces.
“I love Edna St. Vincent Millay,” she said. “I like to have lines of poetry hidden in some works. I have a book — I hate to cut up books — and I cut out lines that I feel however I felt when I was painting.”
Most of the works are recent creations, with most of her energy and production directed after the prospect of a one-woman show was proposed by Art Studio founder Greg Busceme. A longtime elementary school educator, Scofield planned for this summer as a prime working time.
She most frequently works in an unairconditioned workshop behind her and Ben’s mid-century home in Beaumont. But physical space and intemperate Southeast Texas were not her only challenges. Her health became an obstacle and, in part, a foundational idea for her show.
“‘Equilibrium’ is about exploring myself as an artist, but also the search for balance,” she said. “I had some health issues that really affected my day-to-day life and family’s, so this show has been about seeking balance between those issues.”
Scofield was recently diagnosed with Méniére’s disease — a disorder of the inner ear that is characterized by episodes of vertigo and, often, ringing in the ears.
“A lot of times this summer, instead of doing something social or because I was not feeling good, I could just sit and paint,” she said. “That was something that was calming, and painting helped me feel better and balance out how I was feeling.”
Her works are not necessarily hard and rendered ideas. She prefers to let her work direct its own course and outcome.
“I don’t usually think ahead of time. I just go sit down with the canvas, and I usually sit on the ground and work and just start putting color down,” she said. “I never really have an idea of where it’s going.”
Scofield’s use of color is what draws eyes to her work. A lover of modern furniture, art and all things mid-century, she has a theory about her attraction to color.
“I don’t know, maybe being a child of the ’80s?,” she said. “I always liked skateboard graphics and the stickers — surfer and skateboard magazines, the shirts, you know? Everything was just neon and loud — and graffiti.
“That was just the kind of stuff that drew my mind to color and graphics. When I’m at a museum, I’m always drawn to the brightest, weirdest pieces.”
She said her interest in art pushed her to take classes in college about art history, drawing and painting.
“I took a lot of classes about art, not so much making art,” she said. “So, I had all these credits that brought me close to a couple of different degrees, and my parents told me I needed to complete my degree. I worked in social work for a time and later became a teacher.”
The expressiveness of her art is self-determined, not geared through those sets of formal classes. A life-long art lover, she lets her interests and senses create the path for artistic choices.
“I’ve just always liked art,” she said. “I’ve always been drawn to color. Matisse, Picasso. Mark Bradford is a contemporary artist that I’ve really started to follow and like. I’m fascinated by his process and his story. His story is that, despite your background, you can prevail against doing what is just expected from art.”
Bradford is an American artist working and residing in Los Angeles and is known for his large grid-like abstract paintings combining collage with paint. His work has been often described, even by himself, as “in-between” painting and sculpture.
Gerhard Richter’s use of layer colors and uncovering layers underneath is another influence she likes to reflect on.
“I like the ideas and techniques that Bradford and Richter use to uncover color in their work,” she said. “They’re both very non-traditional in their use of materials and their techniques.
“That’s also why I don’t plan out my pieces before I begin, because I don’t want my work to look like anything else or any other artists’ style of work.”
This non-traditional approach is what makes Scofield favor abstract art over realistic reproductions.
“I’ve been asked if I can draw, if I can do realistic works — I can, it takes me longer — I could sit down and I could draw a flower pot, or do a watercolor of a flower pot, but to me that’s, you’re kind of like copying something,” she said. “It’s not just something that’s coming out of your head and creative and drawn out — something totally out of the blue.
“With the abstract and color, what I like is the originality of trying to do something that just doesn’t exist in the world and or all art ends up looking like someone else’s art, just like all music ends up sounding like somebody else’s music. I’m not trying to copy; it’s more like a meshing of influences. To me, it’s trying to do something original with color.
“Of course, I want people like it, and I’m really worried people won’t, or they’ll be judgmental. And two or three years ago, I would have not even wanted to put stuff in a show because of fear of someone saying something about it or not being accepted.
“But, I paint stuff now that I would want to see and have, and I feel OK that other people might see that, too. So, I’m more comfortable about showing this, and I’ve put a lot of work into it.”
To have viewers see something they like, there is nothing more “real” that a message can be, she said. To see something that has a positive impact and can make someone happy has to be one of art’s most comfortable agendas.
“I hope they find some pieces in there that they think are good that makes them feel positive and happy,” Scofield said. “To me, they’re all the bright colors — it’s about positivity.”
She said even with any “dark ones,” she created them with the attempt to cope with her issues in a positive way.
“I did one called ‘Vertigo’ — I was really angry with not being able to control this illness,” she said. “But painting became my way of dealing with it and expressing how I felt. To me that’s a positive release.”
This brings full-circle the authenticity and “balance” of her work and the point of view Scofield is presenting with “Equilibrium” — there’s no agenda, no hidden messages, no fussiness — there’s only color and text for viewers to sink into and absorb.
“Equlibrium” will be on display Nov. 2-29, with a reception, 7-10 p.m., Nov. 2, at The Art Studio, 720 Franklin in downtown Beaumont.
Story by Stephan Malick, ISSUE staff writer