M
arilynn Thomas works from two
studios, one in her home in southeast-
ern Michigan and, for the last seven years, a
winter studio on board the family sailboat in
Central Florida.
"I notice a qualitative difference in the
work I do in Michigan as compared to the
paintings executed in Florida. I notice a
relative lightness in my southern paintings
as well as a tendency to include a greater
number of bright colors in a single paint-
ing. Paintings I do in the north tend to have
darker, moodier backgrounds, sometimes a
nearly saturated background tending towards
black, as in 'Blue Collar', one of my Michi-
gan paintings."
Marilynn has drawn "from the time
someone first put a pencil or crayon into my
hand." Then, she says, "one day when I was
8 years old, I found that I could put onto the
paper exactly what I saw--details of trees,
houses, telephone poles, wires, clouds and
even the lines of the blinds across the win-
dow... I won my first prize for art in the 5th
grade for a Christmas poster. In the summer
after my junior year in high school, I was
chosen to go to an art camp where I learned
to work seriously in oil. I decided then that
my focus in college and beyond would be the
visual arts."
Thomas has received numerous awards for
her work. Her paintings have been selected
for the Tri-County TEC Art for Living Cal-
endar in Stuart, Florida, and for the Michi-
gan Watercolor Society Annual Exhibition.
Her painting "Bronze Sunflower" was chosen
for the Transparent Watercolor Society of
America Annual Exhibition.
She calls her style "luminous realism" and
uses photographs of birds, flowers and land-
scapes in her work. However, she says, "my
work is not 'photorealism'. My goal is to use
artistic license to go beyond the photograph,
facilitating the experience of 'being' in the
presence of the painted objects. I take small
aspects of the natural world, and present
them on paper to awaken in the viewer that
which resonates with the spirit of nature..."
Thomas uses the traditional transparent
watercolor approach, applying the lightest
colors first, gradually working toward darker
colors. "This way of working reflects the
reality of the visual world--we see nothing
except what is illuminated by light--and
I find myself more and more often paint-
ing the light itself rather than my obvious
subject matter."
Her work changed dramatically when
she discovered the Quinacridone pigments.
"When I got my first tube of Quinacridone
Pink (from Daniel Smith) in 2001, I was
working on a painting of a pink water lily.
I had been using rose madder and alizarin
crimson to duplicate the blush of the petals
and felt something was missing. As soon
as I glazed over the pink areas with the
Quinacridone pigment, the ower seemed
to come alive. I cannot now imagine trying
to paint owers without the Quinacridone
pigments."
Thomas finds her inspiration is the
"incredible beauty and complexity of the
natural world and our spiritual and physical
relationship with it. In my teens, I became
interested in Eastern religions, especially Tao-
ism, which sees Man as being one with the
natural world,
rather than in
opposition to
it or 'master'
over it. My
all-time favor-
ite painting
for the first
20 years of
my life was an
oil painting:
"The Nut
Gatherers"
by William Bouguereau. I couldn't believe
that someone had the ability to paint with
such beauty and realism, down to the dust
on the sole of the little girl's foot." As she got
older she became more and more attracted
to watercolor paintings, "They seem to have
a luminosity, life and spontaneity that oils
often lack. Watercolors in the last 30 years
have become so much more than the pale,
soft, insipid paintings that were all one could
nd of the medium in the past."
watercolor
6
DANIEL SMITH 800-426-6740 danielsmith.com
"Blue Collar" by Marilynn Thomas, Watercolor, 16" x 20."
Marilynn Thomas
Hometown Michigan and Sailing in Florida
what's inside
daniel smith extra fine
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raphael aquarelle
color map
van gogh
daler-rowney gouache
daler-rowney artists'
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daniel smith oxgall
daniel smith gum arabic
CELEBRATING 30 YEARS
