Shane Tolbert
Gas Fees, 2020
acrylic on canvas
18 x 24 in.
Courtesy the artist and McClain Gallery, Houston.
In the studio, I search for an intersection of modernist aesthetics, varying
strategies in paint handling, colors that speak to the high desert landscape, and the
problem-solving constructions I see on my walks in Santa Fe and around the mountain towns that dot northern New Mexico.
My painting practice has become hyper-localized where now I seek to translate daily interactions that shape my reality. This current practice of painting and collage reflects on specific places and experiences, symbolic and notational, to translate sensations and memories into abstract compositions. The loss of my father, marriage, and other arcs of major life experience are wrestled with and processed, as are quieter life moments like learning about the work of my students at Los Alamos National Labs cleaning up toxic spills and managing radiation dangers.
My paintings, at times fussy and meticulous but also seemingly unlabored, grasp at a visual equivalence to moments experienced in a dispassionate and chaotic world. I am wading through the present and translating that into images as best I can. The paintings continue to have visual passages and movements. The fluidity of each painting marks movement. I'm trying to capture that.
Dimension
Height: 18.00 in
Width: 24.00 in