Ted Ramsay
Visual Symphony Series
Opening Reception to meet the artist
Friday, February 7, 2020 7 - 9 pm
Visual Symphony 11 : Mozart's Symphony No 40 in G Minor, K550 and Sinfonia Concertante, K364 : acrylic on prepared wooden panel : 40”h x 30”w : by Ted Ramsay
Selected work
Artist Statement:
Music has always been with me as I worked in my studio. Once my canvas and painting materials were prepared, I turned on my selected CD and began working on my next project.
Over the past few years the stress of the world’s and America’s political problems has followed me into my studio and the musical background became more apparent to me as I worked. I reflected on how focused I was as I sat in a concert hall and listened to and watched the music being performed. The emotional power and excitement was both relaxing and challenging to my mind and body. I thought to myself, why not try to capture in my paintings, that personal emotional energy that the music provided. So the series Visual Symphonies began and the power of the sound and its emotional energy became the subject of my work.
As a painter, I had too much control with my conventional tools, like brushes and prepared palettes of color, so I developed my own spatulas from rubber, plastic and wood and special trays to hold colors. My whole arm, rather than just my hand and wrist, was used to apply pigment to the painting surface. All my actions were centered on applying pigment based on the emotions triggered by the music. These applications were layered as the music played rather than applied in a longitudinal way as the music was performed. Colors were selected on the spot rather than premixed as in the past. The emotions I felt were applied with the intensity that I felt at any given second. The first time I did this type of painting, I stepped back in fright and amazement at what I had just created. It said to me something I had felt about music, but had never actually articulated in conversation or captured in a painting before, that is, the visual power of the emotional feelings music had triggered in me.
— Ted Ramsay
Selected work by other artists showing in this exhibition:
Selected work from our WSG owner/artists, and the following visiting artists:
Ruthanne Baker, Helen Gotlib, Kristin Hermanson, Martha Rock Keller, Ian Nagy, Donn Angel Perez, Maria Ruggiero, John Shultz
