Today we’d like to introduce you to Kate Taylor.
Hi Kate, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
I come from a family of artists and creatives – my grandmother, Salme Utsal, on my fathers’ side, was a professional artist in Estonia, Sweden, and Montreal, Canada; my sister, Helen Utsal, is a full-time artist based on Vancouver Island and my parent and brother all engage in creative activities from stained glass to music to designing our cottage. To me, following a career and getting a degree in Fine Arts was a totally normal career path. My father always told me to follow my heart and do something I love… that way, I will have a happy life (paraphrasing) So…I got a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Western University and studied painting with world-renowned abstract artist Patterson Ewen.
I took a circuitous route after that – working in the financial services and technology industries and running my marketing firm, Kaleidoscope. It took me a while to find ‘my thing’ but in 2009, I met a friend who invited me to drink wine and paint with her mother in the garden – a fun afternoon out. Karola handed me a palette knife and said, “we’re painting abstract today”. As soon as my knife hit the canvas, I had an epiphany and instantly knew that THIS was my thing.
I have always been inspired by nature and by strong colour – it just took a while to find my vehicle of expression. Finally, I found my voice – capturing the colour, movement, and energy of the natural world without being bogged down with the details.
I am an extrovert so love people and tend to be someone who jumps in and really commits so… I found my community and quickly became Chair of the Artist’ Network – an NFP that helps artists with the business of art. This put my business skills to use but also helped me understand the world of the artist and the collector.
A few years later, I closed my agency and made the decision to be a full-time abstract artist. I have never looked back!
Looking for the next new challenge brought me to San Diego. I know I needed to get outside of Canada to show my work, and I felt that San Diego had a similar vibe. I researched the art shows, the market, the design trends and made the leap. It is a city that has always welcomed me, and I look forward to coming back later this year.
I have participated in art fairs and have gallery representation across Canada and the US, and am always looking for the next thing to keep me growing. I love to create my colorful abstract pieces and take great joy in bringing a pop of colour into people’s homes.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall, and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
I have the heart of an artist and an entrepreneur, so the road is never totally smooth. That said, I thrive on challenges and problem-solving – in my art and in my business. I am an abstract artist in a country that has a strong history in landscape; I already know that a huge portion of people would not be interested in what I paint but I felt I had to follow my passion. I have had to accept the snide comments and ‘helpful’ advice as I grew into my own. Sometimes it was hard to ignore them and listen to the voice inside that said, “keep going; you are doing OK.”
Of course, there have been challenges in my life and struggles to make it work – for many years, I ran an agency with 10 employees while painting and doing art shows. These 70-hour weeks were the norm for years, and I was constantly exhausted, but I see this less as a struggle and more of a path to get to where I wanted to be – a full-time artist who can make a living from my art and love every day I am in the studio.
My work is about the joy you feel when you are deeply present in nature. I like to only paint when I am feeling joyful as I feel that the positive energy get transmitted through my palette knife through the art to the final viewer. In difficult times, I work hard to get myself into a joyful frame of mind before walking into the studio. This has helped my mental sanity – especially during Covid and helps me from dwelling on struggles to focus on what I am grateful for.
Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
I have always been creative – it is a deeply embedded part of my psyche. In painting abstracted landscapes, I feel I have the luxury of challenging my reaction. I love to paint, but I also love the business challenge of creating a viable art practice.
I am a process artist. Not that I don’t love the end product, I do and am proud and grateful when someone decides to add it to their life but what really inspires me to paint every day is the actual act of painting. Because nature is a huge driver for me, I paint on a Baltic Birch panel. I get my panels made for me so that they have beautiful, clean wood grain; Baltic Birch has a natural grain that looks like water ripples on the lake so is the perfect backdrop. Using soft cotton cloths, I apply very translucent stains to the wood, blending the colours to get a smooth and natural transition between colours. It usually takes 4-5 coats to get that deep saturated colour that I am looking for. After sealing the background to protect the wood and enhance the saturation, I live with the panels a bit to see what I want to cover and what I want to leave bare.
I like to play with traditional composition. Where many artists place the main subject matter very near the center of the canvas, I prefer to leave the center ‘blank’ – the stained wood grain becomes the center of the piece and is celebrated for its natural beauty. I typically like to cover a maximum of 30% of the panel with paint – striving for a minimalist composition with maximalist colour and energy…giving myself the visual challenge of discovering how little paint I can put on the panel and still create a vibrant abstract painting that draws the viewer into the work and continues to delight every day.
I work only with a palette knife. I like the discipline of having to make it work, creating interest and perfect harmony without capturing detail. I work directly off my palette of about 30-40 heavy-body acrylic colours and layer the colours on the knife, mixing the paint on the panel. I aim to make each knife-swipe or petal (or fish) multi-colored and interesting in and of its own right. I want to create a piece of art that draws you in; that every time you look at it, you discover something new and different… for the next 50 years!
This process has developed into a style of colorful, airy abstract paintings that is very recognizable as a “Kate Taylor”… which is awesome!!!
What was your favorite childhood memory?
Such an easy one… being at the cottage. Being outside in nature is a need for many Canadians. We were lucky enough to have a family cottage that we went to every summer. 14 acres of land on a clean pristine lake, surrounded by the call of loons and the ruffle of a breeze through the mighty Maples, Oakes, and Pines was the soundtrack of my childhood. We poked around under rocks, swam until our fingers were wrinkled, built stuff, sang around the campfire with my Mum playing guitar, and of course… painted. It was a place of exploration and discovery – of discovery and creating at the most basic level and really connecting with the earth and the cycle of nature. All of this is the foundation of the art I currently love to do.
Remembering the feeling of joy but also being aware of the way the breeze changes the shape of the trees, really looking at the night and seeing the fireflies and bats that surrounded us (and the mosquitos but let’s not mention those!). And, above all, the deep-seated joy and contentment you feel.
Spending many years on the same piece of wild land enabled me to see the changes – how the lavender Periwinkle and bright green buds gave way to dry ochres of summer and the incredible red, orange, and yellows of a blue-sky Autumn Day!
We moved every 4 years, so that cottage was a constant in my life and a place where family was everything. At the beginning of Covid, my husband and I bought the cottage and spent almost a year there – over the winter. That was another brand-new experience that enabled me to see that land differently once again – beautiful and stark (and cold) but also inspiring.
I am very lucky – I have a studio in the city which I share with 4 other artists, and one in at the cottage which overlooks the lake. I am a city girl – I live in Toronto, Canada’s largest city, but I also have one foot firmly planted in the country – both feed me and my art.
Pricing:
- My pricing is based on the square inch – that way, it is predictable and doesn’t take into account if a piece took longer to make or was born quickly….or if it was a favourite at the time I painted it.
- Example – for a 36″ x 36″ original painting, my price is $2,400
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.katetaylorstudio.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/katetaylorartist/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/katetaylorart/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@KateTaylorArtist
- Other: https://open.spotify.com/show/5tOXTcuWMLYU4WSe6CoX7M
- Facebook: KateTaylorFineArt
