Sharing & Visions

Each time I start a new painting, I search for the unique way I can, through colors and various mediums, capture the essence of my chosen motif.

For many years I was a professional photographer, and thus my camera often serves as an important tool in my painting process. Many of my motifs first take shape as seen through my lens.  As a photographer, I probably see the world in more defined shapes. The possibility of combining the two art forms of photography and painting, and exploring the added strength that each medium brings to the final piece of art, fascinate me. 

A photograph is a moment captured… frozen with the specific vision of what inspired me to click my frame.

A painting is a multi-dimensional creative expression of interrelated layers, textures and shapes. Painting deepens my vision and allows me to expand my motif while communicating my own emotions and imagination.

I am increasingly drawn to the purity of pigments and minerals, such as marble dust, pumice, mica and ferrous powder.  They enable me to enfold nature itself into my canvas. Although very labor-intensive and fraught with technical challenges, pure pigments and minerals add new, ethereal dimensions and reflective light to my final canvas.

“The iridescent light flowing within Christel Ibsen’s paintings energizes a complimentary parallel musical essence – which sounds like this:” – Jon Weber (press on arrow to hear)

Art is about sharing… Art is generous and inclusive, inviting the viewer to add his own interpretation when looking at the final work of art.
 
Sharing techniques and artistic skills with others is a rewarding aspect of painting. The encouragement and guidance of artists I admire is an important stimulation. Offering each other assistance as well as criticism, we paint side-by-side, yet individually, while exchanging creative thoughts on our choice of motifs, on how to capture essential light and on how to apply the necessary hues.

“For many artists, turning abstract, follows mastering the figurative school of painting. Absorbing Ibsen’s change of style, outside of returning to classic materials and the wish to incorporate women’s stories  from all over the world, it appears as if she is also undergoing a process of personal liberation by shedding the limitations of defined form, shape or color scheme. Ibsen’s “pure pigments” are still harmonious, not too daring, touching in their graceful beauty, and often borrowing from the old masters of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. And in the end, they certainly awaken interest in the future work of this multifaceted painter.”  – Huffington Post, April 2015

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