Janice Mason Steeves

Influence of Hue 40 x 40" oil/cold wax on panel ©2011 Janice Mason Steeves Each time I begin a painting, I wonder where it will go.  I begin intuitively,  holding a thought in my mind of what I'd like to express. My   paintings are abstract investigations of landscape, symbols, memory and process.  I know artists who are fully confident that even if they can't see what the finished painting will look like, trust that the process will resolve itself and become a painting.  I can't say that I am so confident.  When I step into the studio each day, I feel to some extent that I'm stepping into the abyss. This is the excitement of abstract painting.  I have no idea where the work will go or how I will get there or if it will resolve itself.   And yet they do, they always eventually do. I love that razor's edge though, between safety and the abyss.  I think it keeps the work honest.  There is some sense of terror there! ...

Thoughts of Stones #5   ©Janice Mason Steeves 2011    Yesterday I went with my friend Jane Lind to see the award-winning play, Red , at the Bluma Appel Theatre  in Toronto.  What an experience! Director Kim Collier describes  Red , as 'a play about faith versus doubt-in the artistic process, in ourselves, in our work, and in our place in the world.  I think we all are confronted with the sturggles that faced Mark Rothko: what does my life's work add up to?  How will I be remembered?  Have I been true to myself? These are all questions that eventually demand an answer from us."  Red is set in Rothko's studio in 1958 in New York City where he was working on his mural commission for the Four Season's Hotel.  The play documents a fictionalized account of Rothko's conversations with his assistant, Ken.  We get a look into Rothko's intense artistic vision- to create art that expressed archetypal human emotions and commu...