Margaret Garrington
pastel paintings
Solo Exhibitions
2006 Hanson Howard Gallery, Ashland, Oregon Hanson Howard Gallery, Ashland, Oregon 1997-01 Blue Heron Gallery, Ashland, Oregon 1999 Guardino Gallery, Portland, Oregon Medical Eye Center, Medford, Oregon 1998 Blue Bird Gallery, Medford, Oregon 1995-96 4th Street Garden Gallery, Ashland, Oregon Frameworks Gallery, Grants Pass, Oregon 1994 Buckhorn Springs Resort, Ashland, Oregon 1993 Women's Center, Southern Oregon State College
Invitational and Group Exhibitions (selected)
2007 Hanson Howard Gallery, Ashland, Oregon Principal Artists, Principal Collectors - Art from the Collection of the Rogue Valley Manor, Rogue Gallery, Medford, Oregon Pastel Exhibit, Medford Central Library, Medford, Oregon Art in Bloom, Rogue Gallery, Medford, Oregon 2003-06 Hanson Howard Gallery, Ashland, Oregon Celebration of Human Spirit Exhibit, Horizon Institute, Ashland 2002 National Juried Show, Pastel Society of Oregon Crater Lake Centennial Exhibition, Schneider Museum of Art Expressions West, Coos Art Museum, Coos Bay, Oregon 2001 Thorndike Gallery, Southern Oregon University Art in Bloom, Rogue Gallery, Medford, Oregon Celebration of Human Spirit Exhibit, Horizon Institute, Ashland 2000-03 Exposure Art Gallery, Seaside, Oregon 2000 Studio 11A, Ashland, Oregon Firehouse Gallery, Grants Pass, Oregon 1998 Jacksonville Celebrates the Arts, Jacksonville, Oregon Frameworks Gallery, Grants Pass, Oregon 1997 Women Studies Center, Southern Oregon University 1996 Rogue Gallery and Art Center, Medford, Oregon Coquille Gallery and Art Center, Coquille, Oregon 1995 Hanson Howard Gallery, Ashland, Oregon Taste of Ashland Arts Festival, Ashland, Oregon 1994 4th Street Garden Gallery, Ashland, Oregon Harvest of the Arts Festival, Medford, Oregon Bookworm Gallery, Medford, Oregon Taste of Ashland Arts Festival, Ashland, Oregon
Special Recognition and Collections
2005 Corporate Collection, Rogue Valley Medical Center Corporate Collection, Retina and Vitreous Center 2003-05 Sneak Preview Monthly Finalist Ashland's Favorite Artist 2001 Cover and Featured Artist, W3 Magazine,Medford Mail Tribune Finalist, Ashland Independent Film Festival Poster Competition Book Cover Art for Garden of Life:A Father's Book of Wisdom, by Stephen Mason, published by White Cloud Press. 2000 Artist in Residence, Crater Lake National Park Ashland's Favorite Artist, Sneak Preview Monthly Oregon Art Project, Senator Wyden's Washington D.C. Offices 1999 American Artist Magazine Floral Art Competition Semifinalist Corporate Collection - Rogue Valley Medical Center Corporate Collection - Rogue Valley Manor 1998 Award, AAUW 51st Annual Art Show, So. Or. Region 1997 Award, AAUW 50th Annual Art Show, So. Or. Region The Gazette Monthly Cover 1996 Schneider Museum of Art Building Portrait Commission, Southern Oregon University 1995 Artwork on Holiday Poster for the Ashland Gallery Association The Gazette Monthly Cover 1994 Rogue Valley Landscape Portraits Commission, Medford/Alba, Italy Sister City Association
For Margaret Garrington the world is a place where reality and memory coalesce into a unique vision of nature. Her new pastel paintings demonstrate a passion for our environment and reconfirm her talent for observation of the subtle. Her reverence for the subject of landscape is evident. These paintings invite us to look closer, to become aware of how the color-saturated scenes also influence emotion. Equal part reality and illusion, these paintings are emblematic of the artist's internal creative growth and external life experiences.
Her body of work over the past 20 years reveals an artistic vision that represents the abundance of life in a realist manner with an expressive interpretation of our surroundings. Her works pay homage to the rich natural landscape of our planet with a particular devotion to those quiet rural spaces one finds between towns and true wilderness. She looks to capture that superb moment, the height of nature's variety, to create images with a tangible physical presence.
While the paintings are an authentic and direct meditation on landscape (much of the artist's work is done en plein air), her distinctive notion of contemporary landscape painting and impressions of reality provide a sense of hazy atmosphere where life is represented in intensified color. These new images compel and draw us into the immediacy of captured light as it alters form and color, in settings of fragility and harmony.
pastel paintings
Care, matting, and framing of your pastel painting
The pastel medium is a pure pigment applied to a support, in this case high quality ph neutral or acid free textured paper designed for pastels. As you probably know, some of history's most noted painters used pastels with lasting results. Pastels created more than 200 years ago, that have received proper care, are as fresh and bright as the day they were painted. Pastel paintings and their color brilliance are very resilient over time, as long as the surface is protected. One of the reasons pastel paintings are so beautiful is the quality of the pure color particles and how they catch and refract light. Because the use of heavy layers of fixatives destroys this refractive quality, I don't use them in the final stage of painting. In order to prevent damage, the surface of a pastel painting should never be touched and should be protected from water. Displaying the painting framed under glass with archival matting materials provides the protection necessary. Hanging of this and all your valuable paintings and photographs should be in a place that avoids direct sunlight, extreme heat, or high humidity.
For your information, the picture package on this framed painting consists of the following from front to back:
- Real wood gallery frame with a natural finish.
- Single strength clear glass. Should one encounter unacceptable levels of glare where the painting is hung, anti-reflective glass can be substituted. Good products are Crystalview or Image Perfect. Plexiglas should not be used on pastel paintings. When cleaning the glass, it is suggested a damp cloth be used with a light touch.
- Acid free rag window mat with a bevel cut.
- Underneath the window mat is an acid free fome core spacer. In the process of moving or shipping a painting you may find a small amount of pastel particles on the mat bevel. The painting is framed so these particles are easily removed by first holding the painting horizontal right side up. Tap lightly on the glass over the bevel where there are particles to dislodge them. Then tilt the painting slightly so particles fall off the bevel. Slowly bring the painting to vertical. Particles will fall behind the top mat into the space behind.
- The painting is mounted on an acid free fome core board with acid free artists tape.
- The final protective board on the back is either coroplast or fome core.
- The entire package is held in the frame by turnbuttons. These little levers are an innovation I am now using in framing to make it easier should one wish to change out the frame or mat or clean the inside of the glass. This is done fairly easily if careful and handy, but mostly it is suggested one work with a professional framer.
- Please use appropriate picture hanging hooks for the weight of your painting. Should there be trouble with tilting, use two hooks about two inches apart.
- Rubber bumpers on the back of the frame allow air circulation, help keep the painting level once hung, and prevent marring of your beautiful walls.