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Jo Varney
818-634-8639
jo@jovarneyart.com
www.jovarneyart.com
I paint with acrylics and plastic or acrylic-based mediums as well as added elements of either nylon netting, paper, wood, glass beads, and more recently, dryer sheets. I like to mix glues, pastels and pencils for experimentation. The dryer sheets and floor wax represent a domesticity I am faced with simply because I am woman, a mom, and then an artist. But when I do art, I AM AN ARTIST, and an artist that knows no gender.
I started painting with acrylics because it is something I can do in stages, and it dries relatively fast so I can go do, what I have to, then come back to painting later. Yet, if I could, I'd be in a printmaking studio doing prints all day. I feel the color and form I use come from within. I have always been attracted to straight lines and architectural shapes; however, my paintings have been considered gesture paintings because I add layer upon layer and apply introduced materials out of the ordinary.
My inspiration are the many women artists before me, as well as the abstract expressionists of New York, and moreover, painters who do printmaking, too. Some of my favorite painters include Agnes Martin, Ad Reinhart, Mark Rothko, and Jasper Johns. I don't believe painting ever died, and I don't intend to kill it either.
When people ask me how long I've been an artist, I have to say, "I've always been an artist."
"We are a channel for our art. We should not identify with it"- Agnes Martin ;
“I know this is true and have felt and practiced that with my own art since showing it. So true .... I am a channel. And others see in my art what I see. It is not of me or from me but through me. Some are moved and touched by it, and others are not ... and that is okay and always has been.
Yes, I have doubts as any human being does. Yet I know this art is worthy. Valid. I studied and went to school, I learned what I could outside of school as well. I saw, I experienced, and I expressed. I just am. I just paint. For now….”
EDUCATION 1989 Valley College, North Hollywood, CA (Printmaking Enrichment) 2006 Amori Restaurant, Monrovia CA *** 2005 First Chioce, Alhambra CA GROUP EXHIBITIONS 2007 Gallery Dejavu, Hollywood FL *** 2002 Group Show, 50 Bucks Gallery, Pomona, CA 2001 "Grace Center Benefit" - Anthony's Fine Art, San Marino, CA 2000 "The Rejection Show" - Los Angeles, CA 1999 "Beyond Form and Function" - FYB Gallery, Long Beach, CA 1999 Group Show - 341 Gallery, San Pedro, CA 1999 Featured Artist - Warehouse Gallery, Los Angeles, CA 1999 "Recent Gestural Painting" - Century Gallery, County of LA, CA 1999 "Lush" - eclectionz, Pasadena, CA 1998 "Silent Victims" - Illinois State Capitol, Springfield, IL 1998 "Homage and Inspiration" - Sebastopol Center for Fine Arts, Sebastopol, CA 1998 ArtShare - Los Angeles, CA (monthly group show) 1997 Orlando Gallery - Sherman Oaks, CA (monthly group show) * None of the artworks may be copied or reproduced without the written permission of the Artist
1984 Indiana State University, Terre Haute, IN - Bachelor of Fine Arts
2000 "Jo Varney" - Weiland Brewery & Restaurant, Los Angeles, CA
1998 "Four Drawings" - Kaldi, South Pasadena, CA
