Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Beth Bathe. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Beth, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Can you talk to us about a project that’s meant a lot to you?

During the Covid-19 lockdown, I went from being on the road for four to five months a year painting on the Plein Air Competition circuit (juried and selected artists participate in festivals where they paint landscapes outdoors, usually for a week and then are judged and for sale. These competitions are over the country). Well now I was stuck at home in my small 10’x10′ studio. Even my larger studio/classroom was shut down, no classes or instruction. At my large studio I had been conducting an artist open studio with a hired model usually on Fridays. Twelve to twenty artists would come and we would all paint together for the day. After about three weeks being locked down, I was missing the live model sessions. With some creative brainstorming with my photographer partner we decided to create a Facebook “Virtual TGIF with model” to be held every Friday. My partner Bill Taylor had years of portraiture and classical thematic photography sessions with beautiful models. Every week he would go through past photo sessions and we would create an online album for artists to paint from. On Thursday evenings artists were given the link and then we would all paint “together” sharing photos of paintings in progress and our finished pieces. I would then create an online album with all our paintings that we could all view. What started as something that Bill and I thought was we would do just a couple of times, became a year long project. Bill and I would busy all week, preparing for the sessions. I painted every Friday along with the online artists. We often had 60-100 artists participating weekly. It was really something to look forward to. I had so many private messages about how important those Friday sessions were to so many. How it made them cope through some hard times. It was really a silver lining in a dark time.

Beth, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

BETH BATHE FINE ART http://www.bethbathe.com
[email protected]
703-628-5044

Beth Bathe is an artist residing in Lancaster, PA. After a long career as a graphic designer, Beth now pursues painting full time. Primarily painting in oil en plein air since 2013 she participates in high profile competitions from Maine to Washington State, including Plein Air Easton MD, Door County WI, Cape Ann MA, Sedona AZ, Jupiter FL, WA and others, for a total of 10+ competitions a year. Her paintings have won numerous awards and honors and she is a featured artist in the 2018 February/March issue and article on water mixable oils in the Dec/Jan 2020 issue of PleinAir Magazine. She won best Vehicle in August 2022 Plein Air Salon Competition.

Beth’s painting style is unique, looking somewhat like a watercolor, or is it an oil painting? She uses Cobra Water Mixable Oil Colors in thin washes with a limited tonalist palette, using unconventional tools such as squeegees and qtips along with her brushes. Her representational paintings have been described by critics as evoking nostalgia, like that of an old sepia toned photograph, often with just touches of color. She is highly influenced by painter Andrew Wyeth, and her subject matter is often what she refers to as the “vanishing landscape”, including finding beauty in buildings, barns and old towns of a time gone by and often beyond their prime. Old barns, a Victorian farmhouse, a back alley, a fire escape, an old mill, or an old split rail fence down a country road are common subjects. Beth paints primary on location to catch her subject at a specific time, especially how the light and shadows play on the surface create drama and emotion.

Beth has a BFA from Virginia Commonwealth University ‘81. She teaches classes and leads workshops at her studio, Short Dog Studio, in Ephrata, PA, where she shares her space with her photographer partner and two cardigan welsh corgis.

She is currently represented by Vermont Artisan Designs in Brattleboro VT; Crystal Moll Gallery, Baltimore MD; Red Raven Fine Art Gallery, Lancaster, PA; Les Poissons Gallery, Chestertown, MD; McBride Gallery, Annapolis MD; Trippe Gallery, Easton MD; Folly Cove Fine Art, Rockport MA; Camden Falls Gallery, Camden Maine and Fine Line Designs Gallery and Sculpture Garden, Sister Bay, WI

Beth is a Artist Member and on the Executive Board as Secretary of the Mid Atlantic Plein Air Painters (MAPAPA), Salmagundi Club, Oil Painters of America (OPA), Outdoor Painters Society (OPS), National Oil and Acrylic Painters Society (NOAPS), Susquehanna Valley Plein Air Painters (SVPAP), Daily Painters of Pennsylvania and Daily Paintworks. In February 2016 she participated in the Plein Air Magazine Invitational trip to Cuba, and has also plein air painted in China.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

Hum, interesting questions. I went to art school in the late 1970s graduating in 1981. Although my tract was as a graphic designer with a BFA in Communication Arts and Design, I did have a lot of overlap with the painting department and other art disciplines. Painting instruction at that time was heavily influenced by the abstract expressionist movement. Abstract expressionism is the term applied to abstract art developed by American painters such as Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko and Willem de Kooning in the 1940s and 1950s. It is often characterized by gestural brush-strokes or mark-making, and the impression of spontaneity. Painting students were encouraged to express themselves by breaking away from traditional methods and instruction, often with less instruction in traditional drawing and rendering. Fast forward with almost 45 years as a graphic designer and I decide to give painting a try. I began with figurative and more traditional representational subject matter. I picked up drawing again, and rendering. Thank goodness for my strong graphic background in drawing and composition. I often thought if I had been on the “painterly” tract in college I would have missed out on a lot of fundamental drawing and composition in painting. At the beginning of my painting career (or restart?) I thought I might have to unlearn some of those “do what you want in disregard of order or structure” but now some ten years into my second career as an artist I find that having a background in both disciplines…both the abstract expressionist and the graphic designer had really help mold me into the painter I am today. I am constantly trying out new methods of tools and paint application, while also staying grounded in composition, mark making and story telling. I think the moral of this story is that all lessons can be good lessons or important lessons. Even if we go in a different path. We learn from all lessons in life.

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

I find that now that I am in my later chapters of life (I turn 64 this year) the most rewarding aspect of being an artist is that I have an outlet to be creative, one that is a personal journey and one that I can share with others. This is something that I can create and that others can see. And I am pretty good at it. I love telling a story with the canvas. With the path that I am on as a professional “plein air” competition artist (I participate in 10-12 national competitions, traveling all over the US) I get to travel to different places and really immerse myself in the landscape, culture and people of a particular place. It is often a whirlwind of a week, painting 10-15 paintings per week, traveling all over the local landscape, finding that perfect location or spot to paint. It needs to be right time, the right light, the right spot. Then we get to share the paintings with the community. At a show opening, I love to stand back and watch as people look and talk about the paintings… remember, all of the paintings were created just that week. I love to listen to them talk about the story they think is being told by a painting. It is a wonderful to be part of the creation, to be part of the story, and to touch others. I am blessed to have this opportunity.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.bethbathe.com
• Instagram: bethbathe
• Facebook: Beth Bathe Paintings, Short Dog Studio