Statement

I have always loved art - looking at it, making it, and especially teaching it. Creating art was the first way I learned to work through my thoughts and problems. While my hands work, my mind relaxes. Out of the many gifts I feel art has given me, I think this is the greatest.

I’ve always found ways to surround myself with art. My short time working in a small gallery taught me that the framing and presentation of artworks is an art in and of itself, and my work as an art teacher shows me how art transforms people. Art is not made in a vacuum, and every artistic experience I’ve had outside of my own studio has informed my perspective as an artist.

I take a great deal of inspiration from three things: circles, my students, and the pastel works of Odilon Redon (1840-1916). I discovered his art as a teenager, and his color choice and use of form to create breathtaking, mysterious scenes continue to have a tremendous impact on me. 

Circles have always been present in my art, as early as the doodles I made as a child. They were the easiest thing to draw when I had a pen or pencil in hand. Over the last few years, I’ve become slowly surrounded by literal circles. As an artist and art teacher, and someone who tries to do her part for the environment, I save everything I can. This includes a lot of circular container lids. My city doesn’t recycle the plastic these lids are made of, so I keep them. I have probably hundreds by now of different sizes and colors. I use these with my students for projects, around the house as coasters, and I keep them around my studio.  

While Redon and circles have had a lasting influence on my style, my work as an art teacher is constantly shaping my perspective. Visual art is transformative. It moves us without words and without sound. It makes us feel, and I see this through my students. As Kandinsky said of abstract art – my favorite form of art – it is a universal form of communication. It is a language that I learn to speak and understand more every day as an art teacher. The beauty in abstraction is the freedom to explore, and exploration always leads us to learn something new. I am lucky to see it happen all the time in my classroom, and I do my best to recreate it in my studio. 

Jacqueline Abend