Using color and stain and sometimes roughened surfaces to define the character of her paintings, the term intuitive best describes Ann Griffith’s work. Often using music to help set the tone, she will begin each painting with a hint of an idea she'd like to express. The painting though, she says "will always take me where it wants to go."

Griffith's stained series is a simple amalgam of acrylic paint, washes and glazes. She finds interrupted patterns compelling, and likens the process to weaving on canvas.

In her textured series, Griffith uses a variety of media to build layers: paint, glazes, oil pastels, earth, sand, and even cloth, grass and twigs. She then uses reduction techniques to excavate the painting. She will layer and reduce several times, building a history of media, colors and texture.

Before reaching their final state her paintings will have gone through several evolutions. These metamorphoses produce subtle changes in composition that allow Griffith’s paintings to stand their own.


Artist Statement
Growing up in an artistic family influenced me from an early age (my mother, grandfather and aunt are all artists). After studying art at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida, I experimented with a variety of media, and in a number of directions, until I found my way. I hope to continue to explore with paint as long as is possible! We are all artists in some way, there is art in everything we do if we do it with love. It is simply engaging the world with a fresh eye.

My current series is a result of a happy accident. As I was working some paint dribbled over the sides of a painting. I was contemplating what to do about it when my husband walked by. He encouraged me to push more paint over the sides, building up a webwork of drips. As this experiment grew, I began to consciously lace drips, stains and glazes on canvas. The effect can be a subtle whisper or powerfully charged.

I now approach a new painting with a principal feeling or thought I would like to convey. In addition to the above processes, water and a heat gun factor into the attempt to capture this feeling. I love the organized chaos that occurs when I allow the paintings to create themselves. Often I'm surprised by the process. New tones are created, unexpected patterns develop. When is a painting finished . . . how long does it take? When it tells me it is. . . sometimes days, sometimes months.