Michele C. Kishita
Storm Line, 2021
Latex and Flashe on birch panel
30 x 30 x 2"

About the work

In my practice, I explore ideas of transience, interconnection, transformation, and beauty to give voice to the tales that are silently embedded in my wood panels' grain. Reflecting on its rhythmic undulations that map a tree's annual growth and water intake, I imagine a place, an atmosphere, or a feeling that articulates the visual contrast and harmony where nature and mankind intersect. Formally drawing from the graphic stylizations and compressed spaces of Japanese ukiyo-e prints, I use hard edge abstraction and colors from nature, that are not typically considered "natural," to capture the memory and spirit of the landscape.

Bio
Michele Kishita is a Philadelphia-based artist who uses landscape as her primary subject. Her paintings are strongly influenced by the graphic stylizations and compressed spaces of Japanese ukiyo-e prints. Kishita's paintings are in a number of private/corporate collections, including Toyota, Capital One, and Kaiser Permanente, and her work is featured in Create Magazine, on the Poetry Foundation blog, and the Studio Break and Thyme in the Studio podcasts, as well as in several literary journals. She has participated in artist residencies in New Mexico, Russia, and Iceland and exhibited at the Sharjah Art Museum in the United Arab Emirates and the Museum of Non-Conformist Art in St. Petersburg, Russia. Kishita received both her BFA and MFA in painting from the University of the Arts.

www.michelekishita.com
Instagram - @michelekishita