Artist Statement
I explore color, the physical world, creatures, and the shared human experience through a diverse body of work spanning different mediums, themes, and styles. Testing the boundaries of abstraction, I utilize striking expressive color schemes, while my alla prima impasto oil paintings offer illusions of depth. I apply just-mixed color with a palette knife, often leaving it untouched for the remainder of the creation process. My recent works explore blue and green spaces and refractions of light.
Biography
Kerstin Glaess is an award-winning multidisciplinary artist working primarily in oil, collage, and photography. Best known for her paintings, they are inspired by her photographs from her worldwide military child adventures; flora, fauna, & landscapes from her various homes and travels, and her nature collection. Her paintings are meant to convey the essences and emotions evoked by memories. Her collages and drawings focus on the shared human experience, teasing the borders between dreamscapes and reality.
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Kerstin's childhood and young adulthood centered around creativity, though she did not look at her art practice beyond a self-care outlet until her university years. While there, as a side hustle, she sold originals and commissions to friends, colleagues, and on Etsy, while exploring her creative interests on the weekends. She taught middle and high school in the Mississippi Delta before pursuing her own creative ventures in New York City.
Kerstin sells originals, commissions, and prints via her website, at select physical locations in Fort Wayne and around the United States, and in-person at Midwest Regional Art Festivals. She has a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology and English Literature from the University of Mississippi, an M.F.A. from Brooklyn College, and an M.A. from the University of Florida. She adjuncts at local colleges, teaches private lessons, and works for Allen County Public Library's Maker Studios. She splits her time between Florida's Emerald Coast and Northeast Indiana with her partner and two cats, Britta and Bunny.