Making Art from Life:

Beautiful and full of dignity, Stacie Speer Scott’s mixed-media paintings have a decorative flair. In their accomplished play with materials and their obvious adherence to the spontaneity of Abstract Expressionism, Fauvism, and Cubism, they remain seriously contemplative. Scott’s style is playful, ambitious and unique, using molding, embossing, printmaking and sewing—all techniques that build up to a myriad textures and references with an underwater drowsiness to them. 

Scott, a bouncy, talkative art teacher, creates works that are composed of paper, silk, gauze and found materials. Her pieces are layered, painted and drawn on, giving them a unified appearance, revealing upon closer inspection the separate origins of the materials. In her painted collage, “We’re So Sorry,” intuitive gestural brushstrokes collide with rough shapes amid milky hues, to offer glimpses of a figure bound by decorative images. A silhouette target takes on the role of a paint-by-number in this surprisingly dark piece.

Her themes revolve around relationships between people and objects, as well as the organic symbols within landscapes. “The most enduring imagery is that of the long distance view of Buckingham Valley that is outside my window,” said Scott. “I am surrounded by green and by farm field patterns, even though I am not a landscape painter, they affect me….I walk daily, and years ago I started picking things up on the road on my walks. I am particularly interested in things that have been flattened by car tires. Consequently, over the years I have used everything from tin cans and car parts to snakes (which need a lot of drying time). I have always collected ephemera…I deconstruct clothing, gloves and shoes and flatten them for use. I just love the window of possibilities available with transparent materials.”

In “Armarillo Brillo,” Scott uses crushed car parts and animal X-rays to create a tongue-in-cheek piece that can’t help but cause the viewer to wonder what armadillos really eat for lunch. (For those who are curious: their not-so-delicious diet consists of mostly insects and other invertebrates.)  Scott’s work unmistakably acts as a nod to Rauschenberg, whose self-termed “combines,” were composed of diverse materials that ranged from taxidermied animals, such as the stuffed Angora goat in “Monogram” (1955), to a police barrier, tires and painted leather shoes.

Scott culls meaning and harmony from disparate images and objects with a sensibility that mirrors life in all of its contradiction and beauty. “It’s about process and the world that you create while in the process,” said Scott, whose need to make art runs deep. Her mother’s support from a young age propelled her into the world of hands-on object making. “I have made art since I was a young child…my art has always been my anchor,” said Scott, who started working and exhibiting with other aspiring artists in 1978.

As an art educator, Scott has taught at Bucks County Community College, Chandler Hall Health Services and George School. Her representation includes The Bucks Gallery of Fine Art in Newtown, The Artists’ Gallery in Lambertville, NJ and Gallery RoCa in Havre de Grace, MD. Scott’s work will be included in the exhibition, “In Troubled Times,” at Doylestown’s Mixed Media Gallery until March 10th. Visit www.bucksgalleryoffineart.com to find out more about Scott’s artwork and upcoming shows.

Shannon Collins is a freelance illustrator and LifeStyle Magazine’s fine arts editor.