ARTIST STATEMENT
Savannah Road is part of an ongoing series, Geographies I Carry — a visual exploration of Earth, as seen from above and within. These abstracted landscapes emerge through layered encaustic, oil, collage, and mixed media, capturing the tension between natural elements and human structures. Each responds to terrain — real or remembered — built up and excavated to echo topography: aerial grids, fractured boundaries, quiet voids. They carry emotional weight drawn from places I have known, passed through, or longed for — childhood coastlines, mountain air, the density of cities, the stillness of a climb. These are not literal depictions but internal landscapes — surfaces that hold both presence and absence.
ABOUT THE ARTIST
Kelly Austin Rolo is a contemporary painter, printmaker, and educator working in encaustic and mixed media. A core instructor for R&F Paints and founder of Rolo Gallery in Denver — opening May 2026 — she brings deep material knowledge and a generous teaching practice to both the studio and the classroom. She holds a B.F.A. from Syracuse University and began her career as a corporate designer in NYC, collaborating with top architectural firms before spending 15 years immersed in the creative energy of the city. That urban experience, alongside a later move to the rural Hudson Valley and most recently to Denver, has profoundly shaped the way she sees and makes.
Her abstracted landscapes and cityscapes explore the tension between the natural world and human structures through a cyclical process of building, excavating, and rebuilding — working color and material into organic, layered form. Her work appears in collections throughout the US.
© Kelly Austin Rolo