Karen Dunderdale will be showing her watercolor exhibit "Precisely!" at the gallery September through October 2018.
Karen Dunderdale will be showing her watercolor exhibit "Precisely!" at the gallery September through October 2018.
Karen Dunderdale works exclusively in watercolor, continuing to grow professionally through a love of art history, museum visits, and coursework with many talented artists on Massachusetts’s South Shore.
A magna cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Mount Holyoke College with an MA in English, Karen taught at Marshfield High School and went on to a career in advertising, editing, and proofreading. Twelve years ago, she picked up a paintbrush and pursued her love of art, through watercolor. Her paintings have been juried into shows across the South Shore, winning her awards and recognition among her colleagues. Heavily influenced by the study of botanical art, Karen finds life “is in the details.” She is a member of the Duxbury Art Association, the North River Arts Society, the Plymouth Guild (as a Russell Gallery artist), and the South Shore Art Center. She paints weekly with a group at the Tarkiln Center in Duxbury, MA and teaches occasionally at the Marshfield Senior Center. See her work online at kdunderdale.com
Artist's Statement
I continually surprise myself that I have it in me to paint. After many years of teaching English, writing, and editing, to find that I can put a brush to paper and create visually totally amazes me.
When choosing a subject, I gravitate toward the ordinary and the man-made—a storefront, a Vermont barn, a local street—and hope to explore it in some depth. Often I will include steps, or windows, or a door—portals inviting the viewer to enter into the story behind the façade.
I work exclusively in watercolor. While the medium naturally lends itself to flowing and blending colors, after I put down the background washes, I delight in the hard edges and textures I can create with a dry brush. My favorite moments are when I trace a rigger across a shape to bring detail sharply into focus or drag the belly of a size 6 round across the roughness of a sheet of 300 lb paper to bring a piece of wood to life. Heavily influenced by the study of botanical art, I find life “is in the details.”
My professional background has developed through a love of art history and museum visits, coursework with many talented artists on Boston’s South Shore, and affiliation with the North River Arts Society, the Plymouth Guild (as a Russell Gallery artist), the Duxbury Art Association, and the South Shore Art Center. Painting weekly with the Tarkiln Painters in Duxbury, MA, gives me the chance to work with fourteen other artists and to benefit from their critiques. The excitement in watercolor painting has been not in only self-discovery but also in a growing circle of friends and art lovers.
