SARAH SPECTOR

paintings for power, beauty, and transformation

sarah spector at her easel

ABOUT

A great collector said that underneath any American abstraction, you’ll find a landscape. These abstractions come out of light and landscape. I’m inspired by the horizons and seas I’ve moved into, and that have moved into me. I lived in the Mediterranean for years, and California for 20–watching the light play off the landscape and ocean. The images I make are as much the result of building as of seeing. The horizon lines make expanses like skies meeting seas or fields. I like to think they inspire dreaming: Light resonating like burning bushes…deep, bright, ethereal. For me, making art affirms light and dark, the senses, and Dreaming. I have been told that my paintings are like Buddhist thangkas - a painted or embroidered Buddhist teaching tool.

EDUCATION

  • MFA, The American University, Washington, D.C.
  • Painting, Villa Arson CNAC, Nice, France
  • Painting, Filmmaking, Animation, Drawing, SMFA Boston, MA

EXHIBITIONS

  • John McEvoy Gallery, San Francisco, CA
  • Robert Beck Gallery, San Anselmo, CA
  • Marin Open Studios, San Rafael, CA
  • furniture.It, San Anselmo, CA
  • San Luis Obispo Art Center, San Luis Obispo, CA
  • Mad River Post, San Francisco, CA
  • Marin Arts Council Juried Show, Mill Valley Community Center
  • The Asian Aesthetic: Interpretations, Bradford Gallery, San Francisco, CA
  • AIDS Benefit, 250 Sutter St., San Francisco, CA
  • Northern California Juried Exhibition of Works on Paper, Bolinas Museum, Bolinas, CA Juror: John Berggruen, Berggruen Gallery, San Francisco, CA
  • W.C.A. Membership Show, Soquel, CA
  • The Art League, Santa Cruz, CA
  • New Women's Art Gallery, Santa Cruz, CA
  • Poets and Painters, Carl Cherry Center for the Arts, Carmel, CA
  • Anton Gallery, Washington, D.C. Juror: John Figura
  • Greater Reston Arts Center, Reston, VA
  • Art Barn Gallery, Washington, D.C. Juror: Chris Addison, Addison-Ripley Gallery, Washington, D.C.
  • Painting '90, Juror: Charlotta Kotik, Curator of Contemporary Art, Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn, NY
  • Emerson Gallery/McLean Project for the Arts, McLean, VA
  • Susan Conway Carroll Gallery, Washington, D.C.
  • Watkins Gallery, The American University, Washington, D.C
  • Kreeger Auditorium, Washington, D.C.
  • Village Voice Gallery, Paris, France
  • La Degustation de Moissy, Pré-St. Gervais, Paris, France
  • Marin Arts Council, San Rafael, CA
  • Crome Architecture, San Rafael, CA "40 Paintings"
  • East Bay Open Studios, Richmond, CA
  • Church of Aesclepion Healing, San Rafael, CA
  • The Black Box Gallery, Oakland, CA
  • Culture Centre MJC, LES SALVAGES, Castres, France
  • The Pope Gallery, Santa Cruz, CA
  • Dumbarton Concert Gallery, Washington, D.C.
  • SF MOMA, The Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C. Lecture in French and English - 19th and 20th century collections.