Artist Statement

Nature is the focus of my artwork. It is a world of flowering plants and vegetation that has included the inhabitants of backyard gardens, the local Botanical Garden, the sidewalk gardens of city streets, and the public parks of Washington DC. Each drawing is approached as a portrait. I found early on that I enjoyed drawing the details of the plants so much. . that often the plant did not survive the time it took to draw it. And so began my use of photography in capturing the initial impression of my subjects. Spending time with the real subject however remained an essential element in observing the details that sometimes get lost in a photograph. Colored pencil is my medium of choice for making the majority of my drawings. It offers both the precision I crave and portability when it was needed. For many years it was the easiest medium to use when I was traveling more than I was staying at home. My full time ‘other job’ for 38 years was working for Amtrak on board its passenger trains. Using colored pencils offered a way to stop and start a drawing without preparation during the years when a work schedule had unique demands. Carrying my drawings with me during those early years with Amtrak did not last long. It did however lay the groundwork for the process that I began in layering more and more layers of color to create a highly colored opaque surface. Today I continue to use colored pencils in most of my drawings, in a body of work that includes oil paintings, screen prints and photographs. Though botanical in inspiration and realistic in depiction it is the abstraction within each subject that continues to offer the challenge for each next drawing. Julie Byrne March 31, 2017