A representational painter whose work is distinguished by sparseness, subtlety, and timelessness, Emily Pettigrew’s pictures emanate a quiet reverence for both history and nature. Pettigrew’s narrative paintings, which depict lone or small groups of figures, landscapes, and American architecture, had their inception in her formative years in Maine. Pettigrew explains: “My love for the starkness of the landscape of my childhood is reflected in a spartanism in my work. My foundational principle of painting is the removal of excess parts—a paring down to an image’s most beautiful elements.”
Currently based in the Catskill Mountains, Pettigrew’s subject matter has become increasingly imbued with the regional history of the area and points to themes of the ‘growing block universe’ and the almost tangible presence of past time. There is a magical strangeness scintillating through the clean lines and simple houses of Pettigrew’s world—the indication of something eldritch that rural sternness and 90-degree angles couldn’t fully repress.
https://fenimoreartmuseum.org/future-exhibitions/pettigrew
