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The Beauty Outside
First Night: March 5, 2011
Artwak Reception: March 12, 2011
More About the Artist:
Marion Raney Oman
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For Immediate Release:
The Beauty Outside
Pushing through the final stages of winter, many of us begin to long for time spent outdoors. With this in mind, Marion Raney Oman has created a new series of oil paintings for an exhibit at RiverSea Gallery that reflects on what’s outside, celebrating the simple day to day beauty of what we quite often overlook. There will be two events to celebrate Oman’s new landscape-derived work. Saturday, March 5th, from 6 - 8 pm, RiverSea Gallery will be hosting First Night, a show-unveiling and artist’s talk. This event offers a great opportunity to personally interact with the artist, acquire a deeper understanding of the inspiration behind the work, and the approach and techniques used. Another reception will be held for Astoria's Second Saturday Artwalk, from 5 – 8 pm, March 12th. The artwork will remain on display through March 29th.
Marion Raney Oman, longtime resident of Long Beach, Washington, has consistently been recognized for her evocative and dreamlike paintings portraying landscape from near and faraway places, the occasional interior view of a comfortable dwelling or her own sensuous take on a still life composition. Within this series she focuses her direction to a defined and purposeful gaze on the world outdoors. Oman considers the time we as a society spend indoors, while also noting the distractions of contemporary life that keep us away from the natural world. Her goal is simple: to bring The Beauty Outside in. Her new paintings speak to the importance of the outside world and its healing benefits when we allow ourselves to put down the laptop or the cell phone, turn off the television and take a simple, reflective walk down a favorite path. These contemplative landscapes remind us that it’s during these quiet moments that real life presents itself. Some unforgettable moments are presented, such as a chance encounter with an inquisitive eagle. For Oman, interaction with nature is paramount to a healthy psyche. She feels that nature feeds the spirit in ways that the digital world can never replicate.
Oman’s distinctive handling of medium is important to her consideration of theme. She prefers working in oils to any other medium, enjoying the slow pace as she blends layers of muted colors to create powerful, yet soft-edged imagery. The long working time spent on each painting extends her intimate relationship with it, and allows her a chance to muse on its meaning as the piece develops.
In her studio, surrounded by dunes, sea and sky, she is only a few steps from her beloved subject matter. Wind-blown birds gliding and blurred by a moving sky, dune grasses laid flat by a passing storm, these are all elements brought to canvas that ultimately bring the viewer closer to an experience with nature, gently reminding us that it's still there, awaiting our notice. About this collection of work, Oman states, “I believe we have been seduced away from the natural world. We are beginning to live indoors at the exclusion of the real world outdoors. I read somewhere that we spend scarcely ten percent of our lives outside. Even when we are outdoors, our focus is often on technology we hold in our hands. This series is a focus on what wonderment is outside of our man-made cocoons. This outside world has the potential to salve sorrow and elicit joy. This is an essential place that we may be forgetting.”
With this series, Oman successfully seduces her audience back to the natural world, and gives us The Beauty Outside.
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