Colleen Anne Burns
Abstract Artist - San Francisco, CA

My paintings start before I reach the studio. I take a visual inventory during my daily walks in Walnut Creek California. I observe the light of the changing seasons. I am inspired by the seasonal color combinations of the trees, the sky, and of the budding flowers. Once in the studio, I draw from these experiences and paint from memory. I approach each canvas with a sense of rebellion - against rules, convention, and predictability. What remains is risk taking, energy, and courage. For these reasons, I am naturally an abstract expressionist painter. The act of painting itself is the art for me. To let go and to get into the zone allows for a successful painting. The consistency of the paint - specifically applying thick strong brushstrokes in order to make acrylic paint appear similar to oil paint is my goal. Color is used boldly and deliberately. Composition evolves with the painting. I often work rapidly. I do not attempt to copy the natural world, only to express it - to create something new from my subconscious. My practice of Transcendental Meditation allows me to access this part of myself by diving deeper into my creativity. It has become an essential part of my art practice as well as my life as a whole. 

 

My early art training from Carnegie-Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pa., to my studies at The University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI., then earning my B.F.A. degree from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, have all shaped me as a fine artist. I have shown my work in galleries in the East Bay and Sausalito. 

 

With each new season, a new series is created, bringing excitement and fulfillment as I see my growth as an artist.