In a painting practice that spans more than thirty years, Carol Wainio has used the slow, complicated and historically loaded medium of painting to create both visceral and visually discursive spaces, places where representations of past and present may meet “along the road.” Her work reflects a process of drawing together diverse references: Western history and emerging economies, scarcity and excess, long ago and far away—all expressed through various forms of visual representation, encompassing everything from “high art” to the vernacular. In her latest work, Wainio draws on the seventeenth century fairy tales of Charles Perrault and the engravings of Gustave Doré, whose stories of Hansel and Gretel, Tom Thumb and Little Red Riding Hood take the viewer deep into the woods, explored and reimagined in painting.
Image Credit: Carol Wainio Trail 2015 acrylic on canvas 54 x 66 inches
