Artist Statement
You might have known me as Staci R. Graveley. I just recently changed my name as I am now married.
As Gustav Klimt once said "Whoever wants to know something about me, must observe my paintings carefully and try to see in them what I am". I feel the same way. Most of what I do, I do because that is how I'm feeling at the time. Creating art is many things to me but mainly it is the best way I know how to express myself. So thanks for taking the time to look.
I grew up in rural Montana and moved to the Seattle area in early 2002. Even with them being almost opposites, I feel that both have influenced my work. I'm mainly inspired by what is happening in my life and the world around me. Not just how things look but how they “feel” to me. Nature’s importance to me also comes out in my work. Other things spark my creativity as well; music for one and usually what I’m reading at the time. A lot of my works' titles come from lines in songs, poems or books.
I work mainly with cattle markers, oil pastels, acrylics and whatever I can find to add texture to some of my abstract work. Cattle markers are an oil-based stick which are literally used in Montana to write on cattle with. They are between oil pastels and paint in consistency but come in limited colors. The markers are too thick in original form to use brushes with, so I tend to use my fingers or a knife of some sort instead to apply it to the canvas which makes for some wonderful texture. I like to joke that no one could claim any of my art as theirs because of all my fingerprints within them.
As Gustav Klimt once said "Whoever wants to know something about me, must observe my paintings carefully and try to see in them what I am". I feel the same way. Most of what I do, I do because that is how I'm feeling at the time. Creating art is many things to me but mainly it is the best way I know how to express myself. So thanks for taking the time to look.
I grew up in rural Montana and moved to the Seattle area in early 2002. Even with them being almost opposites, I feel that both have influenced my work. I'm mainly inspired by what is happening in my life and the world around me. Not just how things look but how they “feel” to me. Nature’s importance to me also comes out in my work. Other things spark my creativity as well; music for one and usually what I’m reading at the time. A lot of my works' titles come from lines in songs, poems or books.
I work mainly with cattle markers, oil pastels, acrylics and whatever I can find to add texture to some of my abstract work. Cattle markers are an oil-based stick which are literally used in Montana to write on cattle with. They are between oil pastels and paint in consistency but come in limited colors. The markers are too thick in original form to use brushes with, so I tend to use my fingers or a knife of some sort instead to apply it to the canvas which makes for some wonderful texture. I like to joke that no one could claim any of my art as theirs because of all my fingerprints within them.
Thanks to Gretchen Gutohrlein for taking the wonderful pictures of my early paintings. And to Angie Houck for giving me the jump start on showing my art to the public.
I would also like to thank Pete and rest of my family for their love & inspiration. Thank you for alway believing in me and just being there for me. I love you.
