Art Gallery
By Michele Malinchak
Tracy Everly thinks of painting as a language when words fail her. Her art explores the passage of time and the fleeting nature of being human, seeking to capture an experience as it slips away. Her paintings emerge out of many moments layered upon one another which she distills into a simplified form—a kind of poem. “I don’t aim to convey one static point in time or all that I see in a painting. I want one element of truth, one small but essential thing I want to suggest. She often asks herself, “How little do I need to say what I’m trying to say?”
In a YouTube video, “Beyond the Frame: Tracy Everly,” Tracy discusses her approach to painting. Photographs of each subject are shown before she magically transforms them into works of art. “I show the viewer a view in process, happening before their eyes. Light shifts and wind moves in my work.”
Tracy was inspired by New Hope Impressionists but her style is more contemporary.
Though her paintings are representational, she reaches into the realm of abstract design in many of her works. Her subjects consist mainly of floral still lifes and landscapes with buildings. The still lifes are painted from direct observation. “Working from life is my favorite way to paint and offers a richer experience,” she said. Many of the flowers she paints are grown in her garden. Her landscapes are created from a combination of observation, drawings and photographs.
The houses in her landscapes appear dreamlike and uninhabited. Their windows peer at us like dark eyes with stories to tell. “The paintings often convey a sense of mystery or ethereal other-worldliness that can be comforting and haunting at the same time,” she said. “Things are rarely fully resolved in my paintings, inviting the viewer to bring their own interpretations and experience.”
She uses broad brush strokes and a variety of tools to achieve her desired effect. Besides brushes, she uses palette knives, squeegees, pottery tools and ink brayers. Kitchen items such as wax paper are used to smooth areas of paint and skewers are used to measure. “I use whatever methods are at my disposal to get the painting to say what I want it to say, and nothing is off the table,” she said.
Her expressive style may look spontaneous, but everything is carefully planned. “The way it looks is not the way it was created,” she said. “It might be quite labored.” The amount of planning for each painting varies. Sometimes she’ll do relatively quick blind contour drawings on paper as a warm up.
“I believe there should be a reason for every mark that you make—that it should be to communicate something specific. Every mark is a decision,” she said. “You do have your happy accidents but everything is planned—does this stay, does this get scraped off? Everything is very carefully thought out.”
She’s largely an intuitive painter, but one who is firmly grounded in skills. “Having a solid understanding of drawing, color, values and composition are prerequisites to painting intuitively. You need to know how to play your instrument before you can improvise,” she said.
Tracy paints in oils with a limited palette consisting of eight colors plus white. Limiting her palette stemmed from years of painting plein air and wanting to keep things simple so she could focus on the harder stuff.
“I often paint in layers—sometimes wet over wet, and sometimes wet over dry. If I paint over a dry painting, I sometimes sand it to join/distress the surface and then paint over it, leaving some of the under layer showing.” We can see this technique applied in ‘As You Seek,’ the work pictured here.
Her current favorite surface to paint on is oil primed linen mounted to a panel. She also paints on Ampersand gessobord, a prepared Masonite surface that's relatively slick. Additionally, she uses birch panels that she prepares and gessoes herself and paper that she seals and prepares.
She usually works on two paintings at a time. “They inform one another if I’m having difficulty,” she said. “Whatever I failed to do in one painting will come back to reward me in another,” she said. “They don’t all work out. If there’s enough right in it, I can live with the wrong.” She loves the process of discovery in her art and remains open throughout, focusing on the whole painting experience rather than the parts.
“The two things I care about most when painting are building skills and experiencing joy,” she said. Risk taking is an important part of both. “If I trust the process, it will take me where I want to go,” she said.
In 2019 she participated in a week-long plein air event in Bucks County. Each artist was expected to finish two paintings by the end of the week, framed and ready to hang. “I wanted to bring something different to the table,” she said, “something less traditional.” “For the first few days I was so focused on making ‘good paintings’ that I was nearly paralyzed. I tried to play it safe, which was a disaster.”
Frustrated, she returned to a favorite painting spot. “I gave in to risk and told myself that it was okay if the paintings…were not my best work. By the last day, I had found my stride again and painted well enough to win an award …”
Tracy was born in Philadelphia in 1968 and moved to Holland, PA when she was nine. Although she enjoyed the verve of city life, she immediately connected with nature and Bucks County’s open spaces. She started drawing at a young age and at 14 took art classes in Southampton, PA at the Painters Nest.
She attended Council Rock High School (now Council Rock North) and left painting behind for a number of years. Instead, she studied English Literature at Temple University in Philadelphia where she earned a bachelor’s and master’s degree. After she graduated, she entered the corporate world of marketing and public relations where she worked for ten years. She then became editor of a healthcare publication for another six years.
She returned to painting in her early 20’s fitting it in between work and her personal life on nights, weekends—even during lunch breaks in her car. She used an old cigar box to carry paints with her. In 2019 she left her job to pursue her art full time and hasn’t stopped painting since.
The opportunity to teach arose five years ago when she was asked to lead a workshop in Seattle, WA. Since then, she has taught on line and in person across the U.S. in Glen Arbor, MI and Nashville, TN. Next year she is looking to teach abroad in Italy. “I try to find a balance between teaching and studio time,” she said.
As you might expect of an English major, Tracy is an avid reader. Mostly she reads books on art, such as ‘Carlson’s Guide to Landscape Painting’ and Edgar Payne’s book, Composition of Outdoor Painting. “You can’t learn it all,” she said. “I’ll never stop learning. It’s part of what keeps me motivated.”
Some of her favorite artists include Patrick George, Andrew Wyeth and Nicholas De Stael. Tracy is mostly self-taught but has studied with individual artists such as Robert Beck, Jon Redmond, Peter Van Dyck, Stuart Shils and Christopher Gallego. In addition, she took classes at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts in Philadelphia.
Her work has been included in both regional and national exhibitions. In September 2022 her work was shown at the 93rd Juried Art Show at Phillips’ Mill where her painting, ‘Rapture’ won an award. Her work was also seen in October at the 9th Juried Art Show at Stover Mill, Erwinna, PA. Other awards include an Award of Distinction from the American Impressionist Society and two Bucks County Resident Artist Awards from the Bucks County Plein Air Festivals.
Her work is represented by Morpeth Contemporary in Hopewell, NJ, Edgewater Gallery in Middlebury, VT, and Sugarlift (online at sugarlift.com)). She also posts her paintings on Instagram.
On her website, www.tracyeverly.com, she reflects on her art in The Global Interview/Season 55. “Making art challenges me mentally, physically and spiritually and sometimes pushes me up against my limits. I think of the creative impulse as a living thing that grows and changes in unexpected ways. But that’s also what makes it so rewarding.”
Michele Malinchak is a freelance writer who has a degree in art and enjoys oil painting.