Karen Fitzgerald’s artwork has an ethereal quality to it. Centered around the moon and its cycles, her paintings are round, luminous, and often gilded, intentionally other-worldly, inviting viewers to look skyward but also, within themselves.
According to Fitzgerald’s website, her creative process includes thinning oil paint until it turns into a fluid form, then building up layers and producing a luminous, subtle, rich surface. The paint is added on top of a gilded surface. The use of gilded ground might reminds of how Renaissance artists used gold leaf to signify spiritual aspects.
“I intend that the precious metals indicate something beyond our physical world, something metaphysical,” she explained on her website. The gilded basis, whether copper, silver, 23k, 21k, or 12k gold provides a distinct glow to her work, and adds to its other-worldliness. “It evokes a universal space including our physical plane,” adds Fitzgerald.
Born and raised on a dairy farm in the center of Wisconsin, Fitzgerald is instinctively drawn to the natural world, in all its variety and richness. “From the time I was little, I have had the privilege of working in gardens,” she writes. “I am connected to the earth when I share the conversation of growth with plants.”
Follow her creative journey through Instagram.
