Liron Sissman

Every painting is a self portrait. I do not paint flowers.  I use form, color, and texture to convey emotions.  I use flowers as visual metaphors conveying many themes.  The fragility of flowers, coupled with their ephemeral beauty, intriguing delicacy, and striking color, attract sensitivity and amplify the drama.  The fleeting existence of flowers triggers urgency.    

Having no faces of their own, flowers in my work represent an image that viewers of diverse backgrounds can identify with.  Overcoming superficial dissimilarities, they serve as portraits of universal appeal.  By portraying emotions using faceless metaphors I invite viewers to be active observers.   

My work is focused on the individual or the relationship between two individuals.  I use flowers to portray themes such as aspiration, yearning, and passion.  At times I celebrate individualism by emphasizing the one within the many.  

I rejoice the expressiveness I find in the twists and turns of edges of petals, stems, and leaves.  Occasionally, I add a dimension of expressiveness by applying paint with a palette knife, enhancing the drama by not only leaving knife strokes visible but engraving the paint, too.  

My landscape paintings are dominated by a body of water seen through trees.  Using water as a symbol of life and serenity, these trees may either constitute a barrier or yield to define a path.  Most often they connote a hurdle as they provide a glimpse.  My landscapes, like my flowers, are not merely intended to reflect nature but rather to project an inner reflection, a metaphorical journey.  

I stretch canvases over wide bars and paint all visible surfaces.  I may continue the image on more than one surface, creating a three dimensional work that can be viewed from multiple angles; in essence saying that the painting is larger than the canvas can contain.  

I admire the intensity of emotions found in the works of the Expressionists.  Like them, I too mix my soul with my paints.   However, I strive to be subtle in my expression of the intense.