JEAN CAUTHEN
After growing up in Italy, New Orleans, South Carolina, and North Carolina, Jean
Cauthen earned a BFA from East Carolina and a MFA from James Madison University.
Her professional experience has been varied, including: teaching positions at
various colleges and universities, serving as a curator at the Lynchburg Fine
Arts Center in Virginia, work as a broadcast designer at WSET TV, and experience
as a courtroom artist and free lance illustrator.
Jean has exhibited nationally, including being featured at the Gallery on Second
and the Broome Street Gallery in New York City. She is currently a professor
of Art and Art History at UNC-Charlotte.
Artist Statement -The red earth is a constant undercurrent in my landscapes. My local subject matter
is based on the rolling hills and evocative warm colors of the beautiful Piedmont
region of North Carolina.
I maintain strong artistic ties to Italy, where I spent the earliest part of
my childhood. I return to Italy annually, where I continue to draw inspiration from
the unique terrain. In my paintings, I seek to honor the rich history of the land
while expressing my own unique voice through an unexpected use of color.
All landscape paintings are done “plein-air.” I feel this method, which requires
painting on location, in the moment, as the scene unfolds, imbues the work with a
true sense of time and place. New York painter and critic, Barbara Grossman, describes
Jean’s work as “a perfect wedding of subject matter and handling…compelling and
powerfully structured.” Others have remarked on the painter’s “high level of evolution
with pictorial thought” and complimented the “extremely rich color and tactile
properties” at play in her work.
