Based in Denver, Iris Gregg has always pursued art. Born from artists, the passion for creative expression has been a never ending ritual.
Using a canvas relatable in size to the human figure, my work imbues an ethereal quality with each layer bringing another painting to the surface. Flattened figures, sometimes simplified to shadows, weave through colorful layers littered with words and symbols that mask the original portraiture underpainting. The final delicate, drippy, and muted washes balance and gently hide the tension and chaotic layers and underpainting.
The work begins by imitating traditional portraiture by depicting an examination of individuals’ physical state, moments and life experience. However, through altering or abstracting the physical identifiers or individualism, the work becomes a contemporary visceral play on every human’s experience and not a singularly identifiable person. It pulls on today’s moments of bliss, sorrow, anger, and death, and like each captured memory or feeling, the many layers that have built to the final image glint at the previous layers.
Individual, local, and global events pull her inspiration to create multi-layered, abstracted, and oil drenched canvases that relate in size to the human figure. Iris Gregg is a graduate from Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design with an emphasis in Painting, receiving valedictorian. She has participated in many shows throughout the United States, including solo, group, and juried exhibitions. Her passion for the arts goes beyond painting and participates in community involvement with arts and culture.
