By Audrey Anderson
Hometown Weekly Reporter
Artist Lisa Hayden presented powerful abstract paintings at the opening reception for her exhibit, “Bridging the Abstract,” at the Sherborn Library on April 27. The spring art show will run until May 31st.
Hayden studied studio art at the University of Miami and then returned to her native New England. Since the 1990s, she said she has been painting daily, using “paint brushes, palette knives, and acrylic paint” to create abstract scenes in which she aims to show “a sense of time passing and experiences lived” in her New England-based scenes featuring pops of color.
Hayden’s paintings include elements of egg and nest shapes, ports, oceans, and rail trails. Even in paintings with natural elements, Hayden said she includes suggestions of human architectural elements, such as vertical lines suggesting buildings, to show the effect of humans on natural scenes. Lately, she has been focusing more on purely abstract painting. Some of these paintings are included in the show.
According to Hayden, viewers bring their own interpretations to her paintings. For instance, some viewers saw a rainy nighttime city scene in a painting Hayden considered to be undetermined abstract shapes.
Hayden explained that she has a compulsion to paint every day, and that if she goes on vacation or is somewhere she can’t paint, she will dream of ideas to paint and quickly pour them out onto canvas when she returns home. She physically feels the need to paint in her arms and hands. She is happy to discuss her methods and process with viewers at her show.
You can see Hayden’s work in her exhibit at the Sherborn Library throughout May, at the Sherborn Arts and Crafts Fair at the Sherborn Library on May 11 from 10 am to 4 pm, and on her web site at www.meltedtheory.com, which also includes her New England art fair, festival, and exhibition schedule for 2024.
