Monica Bergquist Verified listing

My work explores themes of complexity and duality, expressed through fluid forms on canvas. Organization, much like a river, takes meandering routes that ultimately form the power and energy of the composition. When making paintings, I follow the directionality of the paint. The finished work shows complexity and organization, chaos and transformation, ultimately settling in its own equilibrium.

As the artistic steward of each painting, I push and pull the mediums to depict erosion, transportation or deposition. I often use straight lines or grids to create order, sprays and splatters to depict chaos, or explore the edge of chaos through fractals, curvature, and cells. These energies come together to organize in one space, layered over time. Sometimes, I employ checkerboards or grids, representing duality seeking balance: good and evil, dark and light, subtraction and addition. Traditional painting techniques in the final stage pulls these seemingly disparate components together in harmony.

How these numerous systems intertwine, layer, connect and portray themselves is endlessly fascinating to me. Time becomes nonexistent in this playful process, which gives me a glimpse into a different world on a different scale. Whether the paintings depict a macroscopic or microscopic universe is unique to each viewer. The duality and intersection of science and art, nature and built, stay-at-home mom plus artist, color and lack thereof, negative space and chaos, subtlety and boldness, creation and observation; my art encompasses all these things. As my life and purpose, the process keeps me both grounded and ecstatic.

Abstract art with a focus on the natural world, and sometimes a tinge of realism, dabbling in themes of complexity and duality.

I'm newly reemerging as an artist after 20 years away from painting, but being featured in the second print issue of "Women Artists on The Rise Book," the outcome of the Emerging Women Artist Award: 2024 Fall Edition is a current highlight.