Arts and Entertainment

A journey in painting: Alaska to Iceland and back again

Christina Wilson’s art jumps off the canvas, not just in the way she captures her scenery, but also through her use of thick, layered oil paint. Her approach to painting, known as the impasto technique, takes a palette knife through paint from the tube onto a birch canvas. The end result is what Wilson calls a “thick frosting-like texture.”

“I like people to want to walk up to the painting and touch it and feel intrigued by the texture,” Wilson said.

Wilson’s art will be on display this Friday in Anchorage in her latest exhibit, aptly titled “A Year of Residencies” for her participation in residency programs in Juneau and Iceland. Wilson’s acrylic paintings of Juneau are easily distinguishable from her oil paintings of Iceland, which are on a birchwood canvas. The Iceland residency program was organized by a nonprofit called Norðanbál, which brings artists of all mediums from all over the world to the island of Hrísey in north Iceland. Wilson spent the month of September painting on the island with her husband and her 2-year-old son.

Spending time on the remote island allowed Wilson to reconnect with her love of oil painting. The art requires more time and storage space than other paint mediums since oil paintings take one to two weeks to dry. Wilson’s exhibit will feature several oil paintings of Iceland’s mountains, which Wilson said “kind of resemble Alaskan mountainscapes as well.”

This is not Wilson’s first time traveling internationally to paint. After receiving her degree in art history from the University of Minnesota Morris, Wilson joined the Peace Corps. While she was serving in West Africa, she would paint murals with her community to educate the area on health issues. Wilson previously painted en plein air during her travels in Spain and Italy as well.

Wilson’s trip to Juneau this past May was the product of Alaska State Parks' Artist-in-Residence program. The program enables artists to spend up to two weeks at the Ernest Gruening Cabin to work on their craft.

“The idea of the residency program originally is to give artists a space to work in and create art and they would donate some art back to the state parks that we could use for other purposes later,” said the program’s development specialist, Wendy Sailors.

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Artists who participate in the program donate at least one work back to the park and agree to a community outreach event that will share the beauty of creating art in the Alaska State Parks. Preston Kroes, Alaska State Parks Southeast regional superintendent, said these residency programs also help people think about parks in a new way.

“When you picture recreational activities in Alaska State Parks, you generally think about hiking, camping, picnicking, bird and wildlife viewing, possibly fishing and hunting, and other similar traditional outdoor interests as how people enjoy the parks,” Kroes said. “Most likely you would create a long list before or perhaps maybe never include someone creating artwork as a way to benefit from visiting a park. The AIR program not only promotes artists enjoying the parks but provides them with a location to create and share their experience through their artwork. ”

Wilson spent 10 mostly cloudy days in Juneau, but the pieces she’s most excited to showcase from Juneau are ones that capture the rare sunsets of her trip. Most of her paintings feature vibrant colors and rich textures. Wilson likes to add a “surreal, dream-like color and style” to the canvas to turn the scenery around her into a contemporary, abstract painting.

When she’s not painting, Wilson is teaching studio art at Alaska Pacific University. She believes residency programs are important for an artist to diversify their experience and income.

“I want to let students know that just like study abroad experiences, artists' residencies function in the same way in the sense that there is funding that’s available. There’s ways to see the world and create art without spending a fortune doing it,” Wilson said.

After “A Year of Residencies” is over, Wilson will be focusing on the launch of her self-published children’s book, “Peek-a-boo Bear” which showcases her illustrations. The project was also born out of her love of reading to her son, and the art will display the animals of Alaska playing peek-a-boo with the reader.

“I think it’s really important for individuals who are going to pursue a career in art to diversify what they do,” Wilson said. “It’s great to create art and sell art, but as artists, we depend on a lot of different jobs in a career.”

A painter, professor and now author, Wilson is most excited about displaying her renderings of Iceland’s mountains, lighthouses and auroras at the exhibit. Her work will be on display from 6-9 p.m. Friday at the Church of Love on Spenard Road. For more information about Wilson’s work, visit christinawilsonart.com or dnr.alaska.gov/parks/asp/artistinresidence.htm for more information about the Alaska State Parks’ Artist-in-Residence program.

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