Greetings!
Meet artist Abigail Egge Ogas of Silver City NM. She is the recipient of the John Stermer Western New Mexico University (WNMU) Scholarship for school year 2020-2021!
Earlier this year, Abigail showed her work in a WNMU Expressive Arts Pop-Up Gallery in downtown Silver City as part of a “We All Build Narratives” themed student exhibition.
We would like to share with you Ms. Egge-Ogas artist statement for a series of paintings that she has been creating.
Artist Statement:
Abigail Egge-Ogas
Painting II
Self Portrait Series Using Contemporary Artists as Inspiration
My name is Abigail Egge-Ogas and I’m an art student at Western New Mexico University. In my Painting Class II, I was assigned to work on self-portraits using inspiration from contemporary artists. Professor Douglass wanted me to get out of my comfort zone and increase scale and experiment with color and paint. I normally would do myself smiling like a snapshot photo, but my professor wanted me to try it without smiling because she wanted me to look at myself in a real and honest way.
After this initial portrait, I started looking at contemporary artists work to get inspiration. The large close-up of my face I chose to do in the style of David Santiago. The bubble face portrait was inspired by Chuck Close who makes large scale photorealist portraits.
My favorite painting out of this series is the seated portrait inspired by Alice Neel. Alice Neel uses distortion of the figure and bright painterly expressionistic strokes to represent emotive quality to her paintings. I used a scratching technique into the plants to make them have depth.
I love painting.
Congratulations Abigail!
From all of us at John Stermer Fine Art, congratulations Abigail! And, we wish you best of luck!
About WNMU’s John Stermer Art Scholarship.
In 1995, Lucianna Stermer, the artist’s wife, established the John Stermer Art Scholarship at WNMU. This was done in conjunction with a retrospective exhibition at the university art department’s Francis McCray Gallery of Contemporary Art. Proceeds from sells of posters, cards, and catalogs during the exhibition helped to establish the scholarship.
For someone who wants to apply for an art scholarship, including the John Stermer Art Scholarship, here is the link to the website: https://art.wnmu.edu/about-art/
For those of you who would like to donate to the John Stermer Art Scholarship fund, please click on the following link: https://foundation.wnmu.edu/give-today/ and follow these instructions:
- Select or input donation amount
- Scroll to “Where should your gift be applied?” and, using the drop-down arrow, select “Specific Scholarship – list scholarship name below”.
- Further down the page, in the blank “OTHER” space, type John Stermer Art Scholarship.
- The same would apply to any scholarship as one wishes. A listing of other art scholarships can be found at: https://art.wnmu.edu/about-art/
For those of you who choose to donate to the scholarship fund, we thank you in advance!
Additional Links:
- David Santiago: https://stjameart.com
- Alice Neel: https://www.aliceneel.com
- Chuck Close: http://chuckclose.com
- Expressive Arts Department, Western New Mexico University: https://art.wnmu.edu
- WNMU Scholarship Page: https://art.wnmu.edu/about-art/
- Donate to WNMU Scholarships Page (including John Stermer Art Scholarship: https://foundation.wnmu.edu/give-today/
- WNMU Francis McCray Gallery of Contemporary Art: https://art.wnmu.edu/mccray-gallery-of-contemporary-art/
- John Stermer Retrospective 1995: https://johnstermer.com/retrospectives/