Untitled Landscapes. 2013

Waterline Series. 2013

Lynn White Contemporary Art. June 2013

Text from "Waterline" exhibition at Lynn White Contemporary Art, June 2013

Kathy Wesselman uses photography to explore pattern, color and texture and the effect of time on all three.  Shooting boats in dry dock, the photographs are cropped, reduced and reassembled to create a composed abstract image.  The works interplay chance and control by contrasting weathered aging surfaces with the selective framing and editing of the image.  Wesselman's background as a graphic designer introduced her to the digital printing process typically used for commercial purposes.  She is using this process while employing archival inks and printing on 100% cotton photo rag paper.  The high quality of the paper and inks give a depth to the colors resembling paintings on paper.

Wesselman has an exceptional ability to transform the familiar to something unidentifiable yet totally engaging.  The works are photographs of subtraction, to the point of no longer recognizing the origin of the image.  Dramatically altering our relationship to the scale and location of the original image of a wooden boat, the photographs evade immediate recognition.  What remains is a distilled experience of colors, patterns and textures. 

In another body of work included in this exhibition, Wesselman captured the vivid colors of common household rubber gloves.  These works are wonderfully evocative, with curving, smooth surfaces.  Like the Waterline series, these images are modified to become unfamiliar landscapes of pure vibrant color.