The side long glances of a family seated at the dinner table. The slope of shoulders bent under hard repetitive labor. The unabashed girth and girlishness of matronly swimmers dress in a locker room.  Life’s most ordinary moments can provide its most revealing emotion.   I paint day to day life with an eye for the underlying nerve that makes experience powerful and personal.  Through minimal detail and stylized human forms, I hope to catch the viewer unaware.  They see a simple scene but feel a richer drama, one they’ve witnessed, or been apart of.   I choose my subjects for their levels of meaning and expression. Layers of glazing sustain the depth of the subject.  I use my subjects as metaphors for larger themes, reinforcing them through the use of different surfaces, materials, and design elements.   By producing a series of paintings on different subjects, I attempt to sift down to the basic elements of experience-the conflicting core of emotions that make life complex and compelling.  In the end, I hope the viewers see a refracted glimmer of their own lives through my work.      Joan Engelmeyer

 

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