Gail Rickards
Gail Rickards is a cross-disciplinary artist who currently lives and works in Etna, New Hampshire. Her work consists of paintings, collage, drawing, and small sculptural objects. After receiving her MFA at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Tufts University in 1996, Rickards relocated to rural New Hampshire and continued her art-making practice while raising a family. She has had several solo exhibitions and participated in numerous group and juried shows in New England, New York City, and most recently in Chicago at the Union Street Gallery. Currently her drawings are in the Flat Files of Kishka Gallery in White River Junction, Vermont, and she is participating in ARTPM 2024 at the Buoy Gallery in Kittery, Maine. Her work is included in many private collections.
Artist Statement
My work explores my daily landscape and is grounded in the experience of rural living in New England.
These collage paintings are process-intensive. I combine painting and collage methods to explore the personal, internal terrain of daily life as well as the external landscape around me. Paint is poured and manipulated on craft paper and graph paper, as well as grass-patterned scrapbook paper. The spills and flows are meticulously cut out, edged, and collaged; a time-consuming and meditative process I find extremely satisfying. The interplay between the tedious cutting and collaging and the meandering gestural lines of poured paint mingles efforts in opposition. I’m drawn to these dichotomous forces and use a combination of working methods to explore the turmoil and structure in our internal and external spaces. Repetition, grids, boundaries, and humor are all frequent components of my work as I attempt to make sense of the chaos in our fragile environment.
