ARTIST STATEMENT
My visual concerns run the gamut from careful study to poetic, symbolic and sometimes political representations of nature and human nature. Watercolor is my medium of choice due to its luminosity, flexibility, and environmentally sustainability. After years of bringing a feminist lens to examining intersecting attitudes that have determined who can be artists and what can be art, my focus has shifted to understanding the similar dynamics that underlie the environmental crisis. My audience is encouraged to move past the paralyzing inaction of denial and despair cause by the magnitude of interconnected issues. I seek to make it personal…to help us determine what we love enough to try save so we will take what actions we can. One small action can lead to another. What we do to ourselves and each other, we do to the earth. What we do to the earth we do to ourselves. The watercolors shared here are a part of my Nature/Human/Nature series which posits the human body as a part of nature by echoing it within trees and branches that are the circulation system of our planet. The paintings urge us to “do what we must to save what we love and learn how to save ourselves too, one small act at a time…together.
ABOUT THE ARTIST
Helen Klebesadel (MFA) is known for her large-scale watercolors focused on environmental and women-centered themes. Raised on a farm in rural Spring Green, Wisconsin, Helen was the first in her family to attend college. Her first art collage experience included no woman faculty nor were any women artists (or artists of color) included in the curriculum. Helen dropped out of college in her sophomore year to work independently. In 1978-79 she was the recipient of a federal Comprehensive Employment and Training Act (CETA) employment grant for artists. Inspired, she re-entered university, studying studio art and Women’s and Gender Studies at UW-Madison. The Bergstrom-Mahler Museum presented her first solo museum exhibition in 1994. Her watercolors are represented in numerous public and private art collections and have been exhibited internationally through the Arts in the Embassies Program. Supporting her art habit as a university educator for 30+ years encouraging diverse creative voices, she remains a mentor to emerging artists while modeling pursuing her own artistic growth. Helen served as the 13th president of the national Women’s Caucus for Art and tithed time to leadership in other arts organizations working to diversify cultural institutions. A believer in building creative community and using collaboration as a model, Klebesadel is an artist/co-coordinator in two ongoing collaborative projects: the Exquisite Uterus Project and The Flowers Are Burning Art and Climate Justice Project. Helen maintains her art studio in Madison, Wisconsin, creating art and using beauty to bring attention to important issues of our times
© Helen Klebesadel