Jill Schultz McGannon earned her BFA and MFA in Drawing and Painting at the University of Georgia, and later attended The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She currently Lives and works in Atlanta Georgia.
McGannon paints realistic landscapes and figure paintings in oils, preferring to work from life whenever possible. Following the classical approach of the Nineteenth century Naturalist artists, McGannon paints smaller landscapes plein-air, usually spending a month or two in Europe as well as time in north Georgia and on the Georgia coast. She began painting plein-air from the hilltops surrounding Cortona, Italy as Artist in Residence for the University of Georgia's painting program in 1994. Larger works are executed back home in the studio, using the small paintings and photographs as resources. With these paintings, McGannon not only affords herself time spent in nature, but also hopes to impress upon the viewer the beauty and value of the diminishing landscape.
Artist's Statement
With my new paintings, I'm attempting to evoke the mood and mystery of the landscape without actually painting a specific location. I've been painting landscapes for about ten years now, and although I love working plein-air, it seems that I can never quite find one view that has all of the elements I?m looking for. The landscape can seem heroic, phenomenal, illusive, or mundane. These paintings are sort of portraits of specific trees placed into an imagined environment that they occupy regally, solidly, happily. Surrounded by open space for as far as the eye can see, but not lonely.
These pieces are about the feeling of brilliant light on a clear autumn day, everything still and quiet, and the lushness of flora. To me, the brocade pattern echoes the movement of the tree as it grows toward the sun, always moving out and up. The side panels offer a telephoto view of the leaves on the trees and ferns below, pressed into paint and preserved under a layer of crackled varnish. The trees, too, are encapsulated in beeswax, trapped beneath layers of time.
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Education:
1990 Oxbow, Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL
1988 MFA, University of Georgia, Athens, GA
1985 BFA, University of Georgia, Athens, GA
1983 UGA Studies Abroad, Cortona, Italy
1981 Fayette County High School, Fayetteville, GA
Publications:
Atlanta Home Magazine 9-03
Museums & Galleries- Atlanta, May-June 2000
Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 4-28-00
Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 4-23-99
New American Paintings, Spring 1998
Chicago Reader 8-15-97
Chicago Tribune 11-20-96
Chicago Tribune 2-20-94
North Shore Neighbor 1-16-94
Atlanta Journal Constitution 9-87
Awards:
2003 Hambidge Center, Artist in Residence
2002 Hambidge Center, Artist in Residence
1994 Artist in Residence, UGA Studies Abroad Program, Cortona, Italy
1985 Mary Rosenblatt Scholarship, University of Georgia
Selected Exhibitions:
2004 Grand Opening Exhibit, Mason Murer Gallery, Atlanta, Georgia
Landscape Show, Gwenda Jay/Addington Gallery, Chicago, Illinois
2003 March Landscape Show, The Modern Primitive Gallery, Atlanta, Georgia
November Landscape Show, The Modern Primitive Gallery, Atlanta, Georgia
2002 Solo Show, Marie Terrel Gallery, Asheville, North Carolina
Group Show, Modern Primitive, w/ Patrick McGannon and Suzy Schultz
2001 Landscape Show, The Modern Primitive Gallery, Atlanta, Georgia
Athens Lost, The Lyndon House Art Center, Athens, Georgia
Life; Its Many Dimensions, The Quinlan Art Center, Gainesville, Georgia
Group Exhibition, Marie Terrel Gallery, Asheville, North Carolina
Portrait Society of Atlanta, The Lyndon House Art Center, Athens, Georgia
Paradox, Genema Gallery, Atlanta, Georgia
Portrait Society of Atlanta, Roswell Art Center, Roswell, Georgia
2000 Jill Schultz McGannon and Kim Karelson, Modern Primitive, Atlanta
Portrait Society of Atlanta, Darious/Storey Gallery, Atlanta, Georgia
Group Exhibition, D.A. Willis Studio, Atlanta, Georgia
1999 Works from the Figure, D Miles Gallery, Atlanta, Georgia
Approaching the Landscape, Modern Primitive Gallery, Atlanta, Georgia
1998 Group Show, Gwenda Jay/ Addington, Chicago, Illinois
Trinity Art Auction, Atlanta, Georgia
1997 Randall Shiroma, Katie Dowling, Jill Schultz; Gwenda Jay Gallery, Chicago
Group Show, Inside Art, Chicago, Illinois
1996 Small Wonders, Gwenda Jay Gallery, Chicago, Illionois
Entries, The Lineage Gallery Project, Chicago, Illinois. A group show with Dan Addington, Chris Johnson,and Vladimir Ketchens
1994 Re: Figure, Eva Cohen Gallery, Chicago, Illinois. A three person show with Harold Boyd and Ron Wotjanowsk
La Mostra, Cortona, Italy. A group show of faculty and student work
Moving the Body Forward, Lorenzo Rodriguez Gallery, Chicago, Illinois
1993 Winter Group Show, World Tattoo Gallery, Chicago, Illinois
Around the Coyote, Chicago, Illinois
1992 New Sensations, Group show at Deson-Saunders, Chicago, Illinois
Around the Coyote, Chicago, Illinois
1991 Winter Group Show, World Tattoo Gallery, Chicago, Illinois
1989 Women Artists of Athens, Converse College, Spartanburg, South Carolina
Southern Expressionism, Carson Street Gallery, Pittsburg, Pennsylvania. A group of six artists from the South
Apparatus, Taccoa, Georgia. An NEA sponsored show of artists from Athens, Georgia