As a contemporary contemporary mixed media artist and naturalist, Pamela Casper’s work is informed by the natural world and her concerns for our shifting ecological climate. Through watercolor and oil works on canvas, and sculpture using natural materials and found objects, she explores the forms of nature and the nuances of humanity’s impact on the flow of natural systems.
Currently through October 31, Earthscapes, a survey of Casper’s work spanning twelve years is on display at the Wisner House in Summit, NJ.
As visitors walk into the foyer of the Wisner house, they are greeted by Casper’s Plein Air series, which creates an organic dialogue with the grounds of the surrounding Reeves-Reed Arboretum.
Continuing on, guests encounter images from Casper’s Tornado series, which document imagined landscapes. The tornado, as a metaphor for upheaval, probes the destructive impact of human waste and pollution on natural ecosystems and habitats.
Casper’s most recent works deals with aspects of nature most often hidden to the naked eye, the processes and networks that exist underneath the ground. These subterranean landscapes reveal aspects of nature that we rarely engage with. Oil and watercolor works on canvas tap into various perspectives of this earthen habitat, through both a microscopic and macroscopic lens.
Casper’s sculptural work, currently forming a site-specific installation at the Wisner House, utilizes barbed wire and other found materials, such as feathers and wood. In her sculptures, Casper confronts themes of extinction and the devastations of human impact.
Earthscapes: Emerging to a Brighter World considers the impact of the built environment on our eco-systems. Casper’s work asks viewers to consider our collective impact on the natural world, especially the parts hidden from view, that confront and astonish us.
Earthscapes is on view at the Wisner House in Summit, NJ until October 31, 2021.
About Pamela Casper:
Pamela Casper’s work is informed by the natural world and her concerns for our shifting ecological climate. Her recent work explores nature’s ecosystems underground, observing root networks and patterns of matter on a microscopic, macroscopic, and cosmic level. Casper paints using oil and watercolor and experiments with randomness and paint handling by combining brushwork with dripping and tilting the work surface. Pamela Casper merges direct observation by referencing living organisms and imagination using the physical world of paint and vibrant color to suggest the lifeforming processes of matter itself. Casper also works three-dimensionally with metal wire, wood, and found materials. Casper’s technique utilizes non-toxic materials and no solvents.
Pamela Casper was born in New York, NY and currently lives and works in Brooklyn, NY. She studied painting with Harriet Shorr at Swarthmore College followed by living in Paris for two years. Casper’s work has been exhibited in group exhibitions at notable institutions such as the American Watercolor Society (New York, NY) Exit Art (New York, NY) Governors’ Island (New York, NY) as well as the Mindener Museum (Minden, Germany). Her recent work was included in the 2020 Ecoartspace catalogue curated by Eleanor Heartney. Pamela Casper was a finalist for the NYFA Basil Alkassi painting award. Casper completed a residency at E_Merge at Earthdance for Living (Plainfield MA) and The Vermont Studio Center (Johnson VT). She has had a solo exhibition at Gallery Shirley (Geneva, Switzerland) and The Witt Gallery (Paulett, VT) and will have a solo show at the Reeves-Reed Arboretum June – October 2021.
