Kathryn Markel Fine Arts is delighted to announce an upcoming exhibition of paintings by Katie DeGroot. “Resplendent” will run from January 4 – February 10, 2024 with an opening reception January 6th from 3-6pm. The exhibition will be on display at the gallery’s 529 West 20th St. location -6W.
DeGroot’s work pays homage to the seemingly arbitrary, but constant, insistent growth of the botanic world. She considers specific trees alone, and as part of their various natural groupings. Her meticulous, detailed watercolors portray each tree as an individual – each with its specific structure, stance, and decoration of fungi. She also captures how each tree reacts to the other, equally observed characters in the group.
As DeGroot puts it, “When we think of a tree we usually conjure up an image of a perfectly pruned tree, balanced and symmetrical. In nature those rarely exist. Trees are individuals. Trees grow to survive, adapting to their given environment, growing into strange shapes, producing oddly shaped limbs, becoming contortionists to get to sunlight, and bowing to the will of other larger neighboring trees. They grow in context to each other and in relationships with their neighbors, adapting as best they can to the situation they find themselves in. In many ways they are similar to us, part of a larger community, whose varied geography and specific environments challenge and form us as individuals.”
DeGroot’s masterful, intricate brushwork emphasizes the individuality of each branch. When viewed as a whole, however, each painting, vibrating with an unexpected use of intense color expresses the eternal interconnectedness of the natural world.
Katie DeGroot, Cocktail Party XIII (couples), 2023
