Artist Kaye Freeman is a magician of color, precision, and dreamlike artistry. Her voluptuous, vibrant works are visually galvanizing events for the eye. She says that she is inspired “by the majesty of life and the adventure each day brings. I am constantly moved by the incredible colors and patterns of the world around me, as well as by science, physics, and the Bhagavad Gita.”
Her love of color creates alchemic beauty as she thematically focuses on exploring “organic forms and the relationships between colors and shapes. I find great fulfillment in creating movement in 2D work and establishing mood through layering.”
The artist also explores the transformative micro and macro interconnections of the environment, the self, and nature. She works in painting, drawing, performance, and film, as she takes viewers on a passionate magical mystery tour that vibrates with color and surges with light and movement.
Always innovative, Freeman remarks that she has been “drawing and painting my entire life. While I have evolved over my 63 years, I am essentially the same artist at my core. I adapt my medium to my vision rather than letting the medium dictate the work; I’m the boss of my process.” She adds that a recent accident that resulted in a broken leg has changed the scale of her work to become smaller, and more concentrated.
Regardless, she wields her visionary passion using “almost anything as a medium—nothing is safe in my studio. I love oil paint, color pencils, and graphite. I also find editing short films incredibly fulfilling; it’s very similar to painting but much less messy.”
In the artist’s current exhibition as a solo artist in Gateways, now at Diversions Fine Arts Gallery in Manhattan Beach, she explores floral images that resonate with a sense of petal-driven power, work as brilliantly hued as it is delicately perfect. Beyond her current show, Freeman will have an upcoming group show at Band of Vices in June, followed by a collaborative exhibition at Matter Gallery for HibiscusTV in August.
What Freeman most hopes her viewers do is to experience her work “in person and be reminded of life before social media—the miracle of a plant growing or the way sunlight hits a petal. I want them to sit with the work, remember who they are, and recognize how amazing it is to be human. We are truly capable of so much wonder.”
Indeed, the artists’ work exudes a sense of lustrous wonder, something as softly, enormously welcoming and as vivid as a sunrise or sunset, colors that beg the eye to return again and again and take in the miracle of a joy, life, fecundity, and the words of poets.
Gateways will be on display at Diversions Fine Arts, through May 30th, when an artist talk and closing will take place. The gallery is located at 1069 N. Aviation Blvd. in Manhattan Beach, 90266.
- Genie Davis; images provided by the artist and by Davis.