Paintings By Lis Gladstone

This exhibit is a collection of Elisabeth Gladstone’s drawings, paintings and mixed media, evoked by the rugged beauty of the Mendonoma coast — the woodlands, the forest floor, the ocean, mud, rocks…

I use watercolor, pigment, marble dust and ink on paper. The materials tell me what to do: they react, each in its own way, leading me on to the next line.

I don’t like talking about my work. When I look at these images, I feel a certain melancholia, perhaps related to the dichotomy between the solid earth under one’s feet and the ethereal yet equally real phenomena of time passing and place being lost.

Elisabeth Gladstone began working as an artist in wool, spinning, dying and weaving on the island of Jura in her native Scotland and selling her work at a gallery in Edinburgh. She obtained her B.F.A. in photography from the San Francisco Art Institute after studying with Pradip Malde in Edinburgh and in Berkeley with Rondal Partridge.

Lis has explored a range of media and processes ranging from woolen textiles to hand-formed clay, encaustic, charcoal, which she studied with Philip Sylvester in Portland, Oregon, and watercolor, which she learned from her father David. More recently she has worked intensively with Professor Kwok Wai Lau at the Palm Springs Art Museum. She credits his guidance and mentorship with helping her focus on natural media (charcoal, gesso, and pigments), processes and graphic themes that resonate with her imagination.

Lis emigrated from her native Scotland to the Mendonoma Coast in 1990. She currently lives and makes art on The Sea Ranch.