Amy Ross is a painter and illustrater based in Boston, Massachusetts. I first saw her name on the New American Paintings website, and was shocked by how similar many of her watercolor pieces are to mine when I looked at her body of work. I think there are a lot of things I can learn from looking at her work.
Ross has attended Connecticut College for a BA in religious studies, Harvard Divinity School for an MA in Theological Studies, and Tufts University for Fine Arts. She has had many solo exhibitions in large cities like New York, Boston, Atlanta, and Los Angeles. Additionally, her work is in many group shows throughout New York and Massachusetts. Below is a list of some galleries where she has had solo shows:
Jen Bekman Gallery, NYC
Jenn Singer Gallery, NYC
Allston Skirt Gallery, Boston
Steven Zevitas Gallern, Boston
Overtones Gallery, LA
Kopeikin Gallery, LA
Walker Contemporary, Vermont
Romo Gallery, Atlanta
Her work includes watercolors and illustrations of various plants and animals, with a common theme of plants and animals morphing into one another. She has gained wide commercial success for her illustrations of mushrooms with human legs. Funnily enough, I used to have a pencil case decorated with Ross' drawings.
Ross' watercolors, particularly her paintings "Rabbit Magnolia 1" and "Rabbit Magnolia #2" feel very similar to mine. She builds upon themes of nature in an interesting way in these pieces, by depicting the rabbits growing out of magnolia blossoms. I also think the minimalist approach Ross takes to watercolor painting is interesting. In the past, I have thought that minimalist watercolor meant watercolor with very few strokes. Ross shows another way to do minimalism, though, by painting detailed watercolor flora and fauna but then surrounding them with large amounts of negative, white space. In these pieces, emphasis is placed on strong composition, in order to make the white space feel intentional. I'd be interested in implementing some of these ideas in my own work. Additionally, I really admire her level of craft with watercolor, as she is able to include both the natural flow watercolor has and intricate detail in each piece.
I really love the composition of this piece. Its simplicity reminds me of Chinese zen watercolor paintings.
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