Sarah Norsworthy:
Written in Water
September 2 - 30, 2023“For many years, I have been moved by the blue at the far edge of what can be seen, that color of horizons, of remote mountain ranges, of anything far away. The color of that distance is the color of an emotion, the color of solitude and of desire, the color of there seen from here, the color of where you are not.” Solnit, Rebecca. A Field Guide to Getting Lost. New York: Viking, 2005.
studio e gallery is pleased to present “Written in Water,” the gallery’s fourth solo exhibition of works by Sarah Norsworthy.
Within Norsworthy’s selected paintings, blue, pink, gray and soft greens speak to the artist’s search for both solitude and desire in the landscapes of the Pacific Northwest. They document blustery beaches, quiet waterways and rain-dampened streets en plein air; attempts to capture observed, fleeting moments spent in nature.
Often Norsworthy’s layered and scraped surfaces include anonymous figures tucked behind dense vegetation, highlighting her separateness from others. Other times we see the artist, sketchbook in hand, as we peer over her shoulder into the canvas - a perspective that allows us to occupy the landscapes alongside her, alone but quietly together.
Thick, dabbed impasto strokes capture a sense of light, usually reflecting off of water, the passage of time and season, and Norsworthy’s deep reverence to the history of landscape painting. We are both intimately part of the landscape and forever distant from the exact moment and experience. The act of painting, and of watching the artist paint, becomes a tool for immersing oneself in nature. The closest we can ever get to being fully absorbed into one’s wild surroundings.
Sarah Norsworthy is an artist born in Anchorage, Alaska. She earned her B.A. in Studio Art at Dartmouth College in 2002 with a minor in English, and her MFA at University of Washington in Painting and Drawing in 2015. She was a staff artist at the Vermont Studio Center in 2007-2008. For three years she taught art to adults with disabilities in Fayetteville, Arkansas prior to her return to Seattle for graduate school. She currently lives in Seattle where she works as a seamstress/tailor, teaches art classes to adults with disabilities as a founding member of the non-profit Art for All, and teaches drawing and painting at North Seattle College in Continuing Education. She is represented by studio e gallery in Seattle.
Sarah Norsworthy lives and works in Seattle, WA.
Thick, dabbed impasto strokes capture a sense of light, usually reflecting off of water, the passage of time and season, and Norsworthy’s deep reverence to the history of landscape painting. We are both intimately part of the landscape and forever distant from the exact moment and experience. The act of painting, and of watching the artist paint, becomes a tool for immersing oneself in nature. The closest we can ever get to being fully absorbed into one’s wild surroundings.
Sarah Norsworthy is an artist born in Anchorage, Alaska. She earned her B.A. in Studio Art at Dartmouth College in 2002 with a minor in English, and her MFA at University of Washington in Painting and Drawing in 2015. She was a staff artist at the Vermont Studio Center in 2007-2008. For three years she taught art to adults with disabilities in Fayetteville, Arkansas prior to her return to Seattle for graduate school. She currently lives in Seattle where she works as a seamstress/tailor, teaches art classes to adults with disabilities as a founding member of the non-profit Art for All, and teaches drawing and painting at North Seattle College in Continuing Education. She is represented by studio e gallery in Seattle.
Sarah Norsworthy lives and works in Seattle, WA.
