Carolyn Karasek Art: Timeless Realism
About Me
Growing up in the 50s in Southern Illinois, artist Carolyn Karasek frequently visited her parents’ art studio and was automatically enrolled in her father’s Saturday morning art classes. Karasek's parents were both artists - her father specialized in Western scenes and portraits, and her mother in pastel portraits and flower-laden landscapes. In their classes, Karasek learned from plaster casts, models, and nature. She also drew comic book characters and fashion paper dolls. In high school, she enjoyed writing and illustrating a children’s book and diligently worked on fashion design projects. In college, Karasek concerned herself with painting feelings and exploring abstract ideas. Then, marriage and motherhood, and a nursing career took precedence over her art for a number of years.
In the '80s, she started to realize that art might be a career; moreover, it was her passion! Earning a BFA from Southern Illinois University Edwardsville with a textile concentration launched her artistic career. During these years, her creations included folk art projects using felt, silk, threads, and beads. She also explored an interest in designing greeting cards and writing and illustrating children's picture books. To hone her illustration skills, she returned to school. She earned an MA in illustration from Syracuse University and an MFA in painting from Hartford Art School, where she studied with noted illustrators: Murray Tinkelman, Dennis Nolan, Bill Thomson, and Alice Bunny Carter.
Illustration led her back to where it began: studying realism and painting in the classical tradition. Workshops with noted figurative and portrait artists like Daniel Gerhartz, Patty Watwood, and Dawn Whitelaw and classes with B.J. Parker at Gateway Academy of Classical Art in St. Louis helped improve the painting skills needed to paint portraits and figures.
Now, as a realist painter working in the classical tradition, she has come full circle within her parents’ craft. After years of experimentation and exploration, Karasek feels her realistic portraits best express her inner emotions through technique, light, shadow, texture, and color. Many of her portraits combine realism with collage, which helps tell the story behind the face. Time, strength, and fragility are a few of the themes she explores in her work. Through faces and figures, she hopes to create a lasting legacy of humanity in all its beauty and spirituality, both inward and outward. It is quite simply life represented on canvas.
Artist Statement
I am a figurative artist working in the classical tradition of the Old Masters. Starting with realism, I sometimes add collage-like images to my portraits that serve as symbolic signposts. Applying paint to canvas and or charcoal/graphite to paper is like magic when an image appears before my eyes. Exploring themes like the opposition between light and dark and strength and fragility, my stories come to life on canvas. As the mysterious creation unfolds on my canvas, I sometimes feel like a mere conduit. My greatest joy comes from contemplating life’s energy and the human connections to nature and each other. As an artist, my primary goal is to celebrate beauty while telling a story.
