Q & A with DEBRA RAMSAY & gallery Director Laura Moriarty
LM: I cannot resist asking, Which came first: the encaustic or the egg?
DR: It is my pleasure to bring to conclusion this conundrum that has existed since the time of the Fayum portraits. (Cue the drum roll) The egg came first. I initially used the traditional process of this eggshell technique that involved layers of lacquer. Once I “discovered” encaustic, I replaced the lacquer with wax.
LM: How long have you been working with the technique of eggshell inlay, and what is it about this process that keeps you engaged?
DR: I have been incorporating this process into my work, which I consider a painting medium, for approximately a decade and a half. There have been periods where I left it, but I always come back. I find working within a set of limitations to be infinitely rewarding. This is yet another example. I am able to achieve different results depending on variables in my process. As with most materials, continued use/exploration, experimentation yields new effects if you’re open to that and looking for them. Similarly when using encaustic, they way one works with it has a tremendous effect on the result.
LM: You have described your work as "non-action painting" - could you elaborate on that term a bit?
DR: Non-action: arresting time, holding of the visual field in a stopped state. I do not try to direct the eye of the viewer in a particular direction. Nor does the surface contain gestures that indicate action in the making of the painting. While the surface has subtle marks, left from tools working a surface by hand, they have the quality of marks made slowly.
All of this “non-action,” allows a continuation of detail to reveal itself and for subtle shifts to become apparent. I’m not really using this term much anymore to describe the work. You’ve done a thorough job researching, digging beyond the surface to find it. My artist statements have a short shelf life. It’s not that the intention in the work shifts radically, it’s more a matter of honing the words to state that intention more precisely.
LM: How do mathematical formulas come into play when you are planning a new series?
DR: Formulas are the idea made operable. The formula is the foundation the series is built on. It goes like this: 1. get the idea, 2. set-up the math to make the idea visible 3. work the materials. (the idea usually comes to me in the form of a question)
It’s during the making of the paintings that the materials reveal new possibilities. This information then spins off a new series or a variant of an existing series. So, there is a dialogue happening between the math and the process of working with the materials that feed each other. (An example: Measuring Parallels series. The idea was to divide the surface of the panel into two equal sections, but in doing so disguising the actual balance. I was interested in knowing if a sense of balance would still be “felt.” The math to make that visible involved calculating the total surface area of a panel, dividing it into two equal parts. Working the materials to create these pieces produced many different ideas, one of which was to divide the surface into 3 equal sections to determine if that would also feel as balanced as the previous panels. Thus the next series, Calculated Perceptions is born. (Measuring Parallels is still ongoing as well.)
LM: How important is perfection?
DR: This is an amazing question, wow! When I read it I hear a booming voice and it’s in an echo chamber. I felt like you were looking into my soul. You should be an investigative reporter, or an interrogator!!
As I sensitize to a particular degree of perfection the next level of imperfections become obvious. Perfection is important to me, as is my sanity. It can become a rabbit hole. The concept of perfection can be realized differently depending on what I want to achieve with a particular painting. There isn’t one standard that I attempt to attain but it’s something I’m always thinking about.
ARTIST STATEMENT
The concept of balance interests me. I approach it in different ways: measured, weighed, and perceived. I reduce my visual language to horizontal and vertical line.
I build abstract paintings using two different materials; usually pigmented wax and eggshells. Often using mathematics as a tool in this binary approach, I create serially related works. In kinship with artists as diverse as Mel Bochner and Tara Donovan, I make incremental changes within the concept of a series, each painting being part of a visual progression.
I apply pigmented wax in multiple layers, using a variety of tools, creating subtleties of color and texture. The eggshell process is based on a centuries old technique. In choosing the shapes and sizes of the fragments of shell and ascribing the areas between them, I engage in deliberate mark making. Click here to view Debra's website.
BIO
Debra Ramsay has painted exclusively with R&F products for over 15 years. First introduced to the medium at an exhibition in Oregon where she was living at the time. Shortly after that exposure she contacted R&F, ordered the “starter kit” and checked in with Richard Frumess every few months via phone or letter for an informal correspondence course. Ramsay’s recent solo exhibitions include Blank Space Gallery, in Chelsea, NYC, and eo art lab, Chester, CT. She will participate in a small group show, “Illusive Balance:Transcendental Pattern and Layered Surface,” at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, NJ this March. Her work is in many private and corporate collections. She studied at Pratt Institute, Oregon State University and graduated from Brooklyn College.
Resume
Selected Exhibitions
Solo
2009 Balancing Act, Blank Space, NY, NY
2008 Boundary, eo Art Lab, Chester, CT
2007 Opening to Perception, Franklin 54, New York, NY
2003 Seeds of Origins, Arsenal Gallery, New York, NY
Group
2010 “Illusive Balance:Transcendental Pattern and Layered Surface,” Mabel Smith Douglass Library at Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ
2009 32nd Small Works, NYU Washington Square East Gallery, Daniel Ferris, Juror, NY, NY
2009 “In the Middle,” “Push & Pull,” “ Give & Take,” eo Art Lab, Chester, CT
2009 “ Stayin’ Alive,” Metaphor Contemporary, Brooklyn, NY
2008 Small Packages 14, Cumberland Gallery, Nashville, TN
2008 Group Experiment, eo Art Lab, Chester, CT
2008 Calculating Art: Mathematics in the Visual Field, Maloney Gallery, College of St Elizabeth, Morristown, NJ, Virginia Butera, PhD curator
2007 12 x12, Conrad Wilde Gallery, Tucson, AZ
2007 Cumberland Gallery, Nashville, TN
2007 Mostly White, Franklin 54 Gallery, NY, NY
2007 From Minimum to Maximum, Lascano Gallery, Great Barrington, MA
2007 National Encaustic Conference, Montserrat College of Art, Beverly, MA
2007 2nd Annual Encaustic Invitational, Conrad Wilde Gallery, Tucson, AZ
2006 Lascano Gallery, Great Barrington, MA
2005 Incognito, Santa Monica Museum of Art, Santa Monica, CA
2005 Franklin 54 Gallery, NY, NY
2005 Rochford & Messick Fine Art, Santa Fe, NM
2005 Haddad Lascano Gallery, Great Barrington, MA
2005 Sara Nightingale Gallery, Water Mill, NY
2005 Group Show, Hudson Opera House, Hudson, NY
2004 Haddad Lascano Gallery, Great Barrington, MA
2004 Looking In Looking Out, Paul Mellon Arts Center, Wallingford, CT
2004 Abstraction, Graphics Gallery, NY, NY
Bibliography
Coincidentally: Ramsay and Mann, Joanne Mattera Art Blog, October 28, 2009
Ed McCormack, Gallery & Studio Magazine, February/March 2007
Calyx, A journal of Art and Literature by Women, Vol. 22, no.3, Summer 2005
Education
Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR
B.A., Brooklyn College, Brooklyn, NY
Pratt Institute, Brooklyn, NY
Selected Collections
Tyra Banks
Will Ramsay, CEO Pulse Contemporary Art Fairs, London, England
Alliance Bernstein, New York, NY
North Plains Public Library, North Plains, OR
Queens Hospital Center, Queens, NY
Westin Hotel, San Francisco, CA
Mandarin Oriental, Atlanta, GA
9 /11 Memorial Museum, New York, NY
