Elise Ansel

Elise Ansel is a contemporary American painter. She draws upon familiar compositions from throughout the history of art. Ansel's paintings are derived and abstracted from Old Master paintings, modernising classical works. Ansel describes the paintings that inspire her work as “distant mirrors… [for] gestural abstraction.”

Early Life and Education

Elise Ansel was born in New York City. In 1984, Ansel received a BA in comparative literature from Brown University. After falling in love with art during her studies, Ansel went on to study visual art at the Southern Methodist University, and in 1993, received an MFA in Visual Art. Ansel briefly worked in the film industry, until painting was established as her preferred medium of expression.

Career

Painting

Since 1984, Ansel’s work has been featured in twenty-three solo exhibitions and over 50 group exhibitions in London and across the United States. Her work is found in the Evansville Museum of Arts and Science, Brown University, Eli Lilly Foundation, and in a number of private residences.

Most recently, Ansel has had solo shows at the Phoenix Gallery in New York, the Ellsworth Gallery in Santa Fe, and Cadogan Contemporary in London.

Achievements

Ansel’s work appeared in the November 2013 Parrish Art Museum’s biennial exhibition, “Artists Choose Artists.”

Elise Ansel was nominated for the Young Masters Art Prize in 2013 and 2014. Ansel's work was recognized among 300 applicants. Her work was chosen for her appropriate use of and engagement with the history of art and classical painting in a modern context.

Teaching

Ansel has taught in a number of different positions in the United States and in France. Her titles in the U.S. include Professor of Foundation at the Savannah College of Art and Design, Adjunct Professor of Art at Armstrong Atlantic State University, Visiting Artist at the University of Maine, and visiting artist at Bowdoin College. Ansel also worked as a drawing instructor at the Pont Aven School of Contemporary Art in France. Since 2007, Ansel has taught as an adjunct lecturer at Brown University.

Style

Ansel works with both oil painting and watercolour. Her works are abstract, while drawing on reality. Ansel’s work builds on the themes of “improvisation and transformation.”

Bill Van Siclen describes the distinctiveness of Ansels work in her “use of Old Master painting as a stepping stone for her own visual improvisations.” Her work appropriates and engages with the history of art and puts classical painting in a modern context.

The focus of her paintings is often religious. Her 2013 show, The Invisible Thread, emphasized colour over subject matter with clear religious undertones.

Ansel’s works draw upon modern, secular masterpieces as well. Her 2013 show, “Drawn from History,” was inspired by “Master works from the collections in London.”

Elise Ansel has described her own work as “inspired by Renaissance and Baroque depictions of bacchanals and figure in the landscape... [she then] re-vision[s] Renaissance and Baroque paintings in order to explore their relevance to twenty-first century culture.”

Press

• January 2011: Van Siclen, Bill. “‘Opposites attract’ at Providence show,” The Providence Journal
• January/February 2011: Weisgall, Deboarh. “Elise Ansel,” Maine
• August 2013: Abatemarco, Michael. “A Renaissance renaissance: Elise Ansel reinterprets the masters,” Pasatiempo
• November 2013: Segal, Mark. “At the Parrish, ‘Artists Choose Artists.'” The East Hampton Street.
• October 2014: Cynthia Corbett Gallery interviewed Ansel about her Young Masters work. “Shortlisted Artist Elise Ansel on her Work“
• December 2014: Saatchi Art, “Inside the Studio: Elise Ansel (USA),” Saatchi Art Magazine