July 2023 Jane Whitehurst, Expressionist Painter

Jane Whitehurst shares her expressionist paintings and method

Walking into a room filled with Jane Whitehurst's canvases can be mind boggling. They are huge squares and rectangles painted in eye-popping colors and abstract forms.

Jane is a California girl, born and raised there. As a child, she sat at the dining room table with her father and colored while he painted abstract forms and caricature faces.

As an adult, living in Houston, Texas, she attended the Glassell School of Art and served on the Board of the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. She returned to California and got involved in interior design which she studied at California State University in Fresno. She was a commercial interior designer for many years while still maintaining an art studio. Jane also studied sculpture, which was her focus before she began concentrating on painting in 1994.

She considers herself an abstract expressionist. She believes this expresses who you are, and believes herself successful if the viewer can sense how she was feeling when looking at her paintings. She believes your response to a painting is important.

Jane uses a caulking gun to apply oil paint to her canvases, one gun for each color. To mix colors, she works with palette paper spread on a table in her studio. For marking and removing she uses a scraper.

Jane was asked if she knew what she was going to paint before she started. She said "no", she just makes a big mark on her canvas and sees where it takes her. She is very consistent - in her studio every day and plays music while she works. Shades of pink and pale greens are her favorite colors.

Her signature is integrated within the painting’s design. It takes her several days to complete a piece. When asked how she transports her large canvases, she replied "I rent a U-Haul". The canvases she purchases at Michael's.

Jane has a studio in Gay, GA., does commissions and displays in several galleries. Obviously, Jane Whitehurst has fun while she is painting! Special thanks to Barbara Kelly for the demo article and to Gwen Brown for the pictures.