Rachel Constantine (born 1973) is a

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...

-based realist /

impressionist Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement characterized by relatively small, thin, yet visible brush strokes, open composition, emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities (often accentuating the effects of the passage ...

painter."Philly Artists Who Will Make You Rich," (2009, November). Philadelphia Magazine, p. 36. Her work has been exhibited in the

Philadelphia Museum of Art The Philadelphia Museum of Art (PMoA) is an art museum originally chartered in 1876 for the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia. The main museum building was completed in 1928 on Fairmount, a hill located at the northwest end of the Benjamin Fr ...

, the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts Museum, the Philadelphia Sketch Club, and the Woodmere Art Museum in Chestnut Hill, PA. Her painting "Self Portrait with a Man" was purchased by The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts for their permanent collection. In 2006, Constantine was invited to exhibit in Artworks Gallery at the Philadelphia Museum of Art as the local complement to the Museum's exhibition: ''Wyeth: Memory and Magic''. Her work can be found in The Vivian O. and Meyer P. Potamkin Collection in the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, and is featured in the book ''Alla Prima: A Contemporary Guide to Traditional Direct Painting'' written by Al Gury, the chairman of the Pennsylvania Academy's painting department.

Works

In her ''Monument'' (2006), Constantine explores themes that are at once personal and timeless. The composition alludes both to the symbolic nature morte of the

Baroque The Baroque (, ; ) is a style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished in Europe from the early 17th century until the 1750s. In the territories of the Spanish and Portuguese empires including t ...

era and to the still lifes of

Chardin Chardin is a French surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Jean-Baptiste-Siméon Chardin, (1699–1779), French painter noted for his still life works * Jean Chardin, (1643–1713), French jeweller and traveller, author of ''The Trave ...

. Her own sensibility adds poetry as well as an edge of modern anxiety and sadness. In her ''Swan Pond'' (2002), the amount of thinner, oil, and so forth added to the paint has a profound effect on the quality of the brush calligraphy and the details in a painting. Broad, scumbled masses provide the setting for paint that has varying degrees of oil added to it. The gazebo, water reflection, and swans achieve their clarity because they are rendered with brushstrokes that are more thickly loaded with paint and also because that paint has a small amount of oil added. This follows the "lean to fat" concept of layering. The "fatter" final, detail touches sit on top with clarity due to the added oil, which created a sharper edge over the less oily paint beneath.

Beyond the Surface

Constantine made her curatorial debut at the Principle Gallery in Alexandria, Virginia, with ''Beyond the Surface'', a group show featuring work from realist artist who include conceptual elements in their work along with their high levels of technical mastery. Artists chosen by Constantine include Daniel Sprick, Mario Robinson, Charles Morris, Rose Frantzen, Stephen Layne, Amy Kann, Renee Foulks, Stephen Early, and Stephen Cefalo."American Art Collector," (2013, November). Beyond the Surface, p. 156.

Interview

Constantine's projects are typically sparked by a particular quality that she observes in someone that she feels compelled to try to capture and translate visually. She almost always paints people she knows because she prefers to have that emotional connection going in. Constantine says, "my paintings don't necessarily aim to be "about" the person I'm working with; it's the characteristics of the individual that I try to use as a vehicle to express larger concepts. Typically, I'll bring subject into my studio, try my best to get them to relax and not "model," and then photograph them in an attempt to achieve a specific pose that speaks to me. I try to have as few preconceptions as possible at this point, because my whole goal is to capture a "found moment." Once the pose is set, I bring the model back for sittings, as needed." Constantine thinks that classical painting is all about light; she finds in her own work that a piece's success often rises and falls according to the accuracy of its depiction. she says, "in learning to paint light, one learns to capture emotion. That's why I rarely use artificial light sources; there's a limitlessness about the color and range of natural light that artificial light just can't reproduce. To my thinking, color in and of itself does not make art. There's form, function and foundation there, it's one thing to say something's beautiful- because there's beauty in almost everything, if you take the time to stop and really look hard enough- but it's another to call it a work of art. So I tend to admire painters who are strong draftsmen first."Menendez, D. (2009). Poets and Artists (Vol. 2).

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Constantine, Rachel 1973 births Living people American women painters 21st-century American painters Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts alumni University of the Arts (Philadelphia) alumni 21st-century American women artists