Lesley Anne Spowart "The Door" Mixed Media, Large Framed Abstract Painting in Slate Blue and Gold, Carmel California Art, Statement Artwork, 2024

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Tall veils of blue, gray and pale violet fall through the upper half of this large framed abstract in mixed … Read more Tall veils of blue, gray and pale violet fall through the upper half of this large framed abstract in mixed media by Lesley Anne Spowart, split by two slender gold lines and a looping gold curve that ends in a plum-colored form. A small square of grid-like texture is pressed into the upper right. Below a ragged band of crimson, a deep slate-blue ground carries two golden ovals, each holding a smudge of rose pink, and a few short gold dashes that trail off to the right. Vertical drag marks suggest rain on glass. Spowart's work often sets reality against illusion, and this scene reads as part doorway, part water.

Vertical and substantial at 37 inches, it suits an entry, a stairwell, a dining room or the wall above a console. The gold frame and gold lines warm slate and navy rooms, and the piece pairs naturally with deep green velvet, brass lighting, marble and pale plaster. It stands as a single statement on a quiet wall, and the cool palette keeps it calm beside richer woods.

Mixed media, 25 x 37 x 1.5 in (63.5 x 94 x 3.8 cm). Framed in gold.

Lesley Anne Spowart builds mixed media surfaces from acrylic, paper and drawn or scratched marks, laying down color and then sanding, scraping and mark making until the layers push through one another. She welcomes the resistance of the support, and her wider practice includes printmaking, photographic xerography, beeswax and tar. She works in a Monterey studio housed in a retired wine cellar.

Lesley Anne Spowart grew up on Cape Cod, Massachusetts, and earned a B.A. in Art History from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, before graduate study at UC Davis, UC Riverside and Cal State Fullerton, where she studied museum practice and exhibition design. As a student she helped install works by artists including Sol LeWitt, Beatrice Wood and Viola Frey. She lives in Monterey, California, where she and her husband raised three children.

A self-described colorist, she works in beeswax, tar, photographic xerography, acrylic and collage, painting abstractions, landscapes and animals in a studio set in a retired wine cellar. She has exhibited widely on the Monterey Peninsula and nationally, including at the Monterey Museum of Art, and her work is held in collections including Community Hospital of the Monterey Peninsula and Salinas Valley Memorial Hospital. She was voted Best Local Artist by the Monterey County Weekly in 2010. See less