Chad Crume

Artist Statement

Working in gouache at a small scale, and oil at larger scales, I wish to create portraits of moments in nature or incidental scenes that exist without any specific human narrative superimposed.

These paintings invite a casual, wandering viewing—across trees, water, light and shadow—captured in color and gesture. The otherwise still moments have no single subject and no specific narrative, encouraging unhurried contemplation.

The only drama is in the light and color, and varying degrees of tension and stasis in composition on the actual 2D plane and the perceived 3D space. Light is often the only dramatic artifice employed, while the colors are an abstracted framework, usually a triad of single pigment paints and the “semi-tonal” spaces between them, used to build perception of light and environmental space.