Caryn Baumgartner

Caryn Baumgartner is an artist living and working in Long Beach, California. Her work is primarily abstract figurative and concerned with exploring time and journey through line, form and narrative.

Her subject matter draws upon imagination, dreams and the natural world. She employs a variety of mediums, including oil, wax and charcoal in her work. She is very interested in surface quality and frequently layers, scrapes, carves, draws, and wipes away until the piece resolves itself. Her pieces often take on many forms through that process–both human and animal–before eventually resolving into their final state; a fallen bird becomes a boy, a child dissolves into a fawn, a bear makes way for a stag. A portrait turns in upon itself, or simply fades back into canvas.

Her most recent work involves a further abstraction of image by slicing finished artwork and reassembling into yet another form. This different perspective holds a memory of the original piece while introducing a new perspective, a new language in which to explore.

Ultimately, the abstracting of image and form over time reveal traces of these explorations woven throughout the final piece.