Nancy Louise Kruse

My paintings are a result from a desire to develop a personal style emphasizing color.  I have never forgotten my reaction when I first saw a painting by Matisse and how beautiful his colors were. I was especially impressed with his use of strong colors during his association with an artists’ group in Paris known as Les Fauves (the wild beasts).  But unlike the Fauves who used painterly brushstrokes and expressive style, I wanted to go in a different directiion.  Whatever I did, I knew that I would use the bold colors like Matisse but with my own detailed rendering of everyday life, a characteristic of the realists.  Hence, my paintings contain recognizable subject matter taken from readily available old family photos.  What the viewer sees is a composite of images from two, three or more photos to create the content of one painting. I created my own world by sometimes using color in unexpected ways.  Life is vibrant and I wanted my colors to reflect that belief. The study of color theory will be a major focus in my paintings for years to come.