Color Project: Artist Statement

I have decided to recreate Andrew Wyeth's painting called Christina's World. This artwork was painted in 1948 inspired by a lady named Anna Christina Olson, a longtime resident of the Cushing,Maine farm pictured in the painting. She had a degenerative muscle disorder that disabled her to walk, so she crawled around the house and grounds to avoid the use of a wheel chair. Christina's World also represent a plaintive style of painting figures, muted palettes, and barren landscapes that Andrew Wyeth might have used to express his inner grief to the death his father, N.C.Wyeth, who was killed at a railway crossing. This artwork has played a large part in the pop culture as many writers, filmmakers, and other visual artists start to recognize the significance and greatness of it. 

I chose to recreate this specific artwork because it caught my attention the moment I first glance at it. The plainness of the painting calmed my mind, and I could imagine myself being in a different world or place. When I learned the story and inspiration behind the picture, I view it in a total different way that reached out to me. Somehow, I think that this artwork symbolized how I feel powerless in my life when I cannot control certain situations and problems in the world that I wish I could resolve. Through this painting, I also realized how color can effect emotions. The original ground colors are so monotonous to me that it seems like the world is just a dull and lonely place. This caused me to change the colors majorly to show my idea that the world can be beautiful and exciting.

To recreate this piece of art, I wanted the theme and characters to remain similar to the original. The lady with the pink dress sitting on a bench is viewing a city across the river, and the wheel chair by her represents how Anna Christina Olson  refused to use a wheelchair.   In my interpretation, I tried to use as many color palettes (such as primary, secondary, tertiary, analogous, complementary, split complementary, triadic, tetradic and monochromatic) to produce a mixture of different coloring for various parts of the art piece. Additionally, I changed the materials by using mix media (color pencils, pastels, water colors, acrylic paints, and gel pen) instead of egg tempera, which was originally used by Andrew Wyeth. There are hard textures and soft textures existing in the art which, I believe, varies from the original style/technique of the artwork. Overall, this project took longer than I expected, and I get to experiment with painting and experience the agony of making a bad mistake that cannot be erased or fixed easily. Even though the result is not fully satisfying compared to my expectation, I think the effort is worth it.

Six Project Sketches

Halfway Photo

Finished Photo

Andrew Wyeth, Christina's World