Works
Overview

"Anne Marchand's paintings transport us into virtual worlds that form themselves before our eyes. She presents visions of a reality that are alive with shifting space, moving color, and animated lines. These phenomena are embodied in the material reality of paint, along with a range of materials embedded in the work's surface."

 

- John Mendelsohn

Abstract painting can thrust us into the unknown, immersing us in the midst of liminal visual and emotional experiences, without fixed name or context. This kind of art is full of risk and unexpected reward, asking of the viewer to take a fraught journey right along with the artist.

 

Anne Marchand’s paintings transport us into virtual worlds that form themselves before our eyes. She presents visions of a reality that are alive with shifting space, moving color, and animated lines. These phenomena are embodied in the material reality of paint, along with a range of materials embedded in the work’s surface. 

 

In Marchand’s work over the past ten years, the emotional range, poetic import, and inner structures have evolved significantly. What remains consistent is this artist’s pursuit of a quality of mystery and sensuousness in ever-changing scenarios of transformation.

 

A decade ago, Marchand’s work was strongly inflected by emphatic gestures, implying cosmic horizons and elliptical orbits. In the past five years, the paintings have developed with a great sense of expressive freedom and formal invention. Arcing lines of energy and an underlying sense of geometry are now constantly being interrupted by new, intervening passages of color and form. 

 

For Marchand, the imaginal domains that she creates are made of disparate impulses, which together realize a new, exuberant experience. As in a dream, one sequence can overtake the previous one, with hints of imagery and directional signs persistently making themselves known. We can think of these paintings as evocations of the artist’s consciousness, infused with the physicality of the body, the call of memory, and the sensation of color.

 

In recent works, paint appears in thick swaths, thin veils, rivulets, and in flows of enamel, ink, and acrylic. The interacting of differing viscosities forms liquid fields, reminiscent of weather systems and of biological growth. Marchand allows the poetic association in her paintings to arise naturally from the transit between above and below, the winding path, and the dissolving structure. There are the smaller incidents of patterned fabric, glass beads, along with stenciled words and diagrammatic images. And enlivening everything is color, emerging in multifarious ways: like a blush in a cloud, a tint in water, a harmonic chord, or a glowing fire.

 

- John Mendelsohn

 

Video
Biography

"A parallel exists between Marchand's painting process and the continued understanding of heavens all around us. For all its discoveries, science relies on chance for unexpected findings as much as Marchand enjoys accidental effects in paint."

 

- Jonathan Goodman

Anne Marchand was born in New Orleans in 1950 and her early interest in art was nurtured during her Catholic grade school years and later in high school. She went on to major in art at Auburn University, graduating with a BA in 1971, and then earned an MFA from the University of Georgia in 1975. Her early artistic focus was the figure, and she was especially drawn to the work of Francis Bacon for his expressive paintings of the human body.

 

Marchand’s other early influences include 20th century modernist painters, the Abstract Expressionists, and the work of Carl Jung, with his reflections on dream imagery and psychological states. She credits her upbringing in New Orleans for her sensitivity to, “a sense of awe at the power and majesty of nature.” The art of other cultures has been an important inspiration, particularly the petroglyphs and the sacred practices of the Native Americans of the Southwest, which informed three series of works and related exhibitions in the 1980s.

 

During the 1990s, Marchand worked in a variety of mediums on paper in loose gestural strokes, using symbols from the Southwest, nature, and dance movements. In 2001, she won a commission for a public art project in Washington, DC (she has lived there since 1978), a large-scale mural based on her Cityscape paintings, and other public projects would follow.

 

In 2005 Marchand’s Ellipsis paintings, with their arcing lines and vivid color, expressed her desire to create “cosmoscapes”, inspired by deep space. Mystical themes came to the fore in the paintings, stimulated by readings by Garcia Lorca, Kandinsky, and Rumi. Travel to India brought a range of new color palettes and fabrics that she incorporated into her work.

 

Beginning in 2010, Marchand began experimenting in paintings with acrylic mediums and interference and pearlescent pigments. With these materials, qualities of radiance and light became active metaphors reflecting an inner state of being. Images of planets from the Hubble telescope inspired the painter to introduce circular imagery into her work. The nebulas and galaxies suggested biological structures, and Marchand realized the connection between space and the body as manifestations of the same universal energy.

 

In a series of small works beginning in 2013, Marchand investigated layering paint and other materials embedded in the surface. At the beginning of 2016, with a residency at the Project Space in Mt. Rainier, MD, her work increased in scale, using a process driven by the flow of liquid paint. The new work is underpinned by a structure of geometric fabrics embedded under translucent paint, anchoring paint and charcoal marks, thread, glass beads, and other elements.

Exhibitions
Bibliography

Selected Bibliography

 

2022   “Anne Marchand, Abstractions”, Glasstire, Texas Visual Art, August 9, 2022.

"In The Cosmos", Abstractions: Anne Marchand by Nancy Moyer, The Monitor News, August 8, 2022.

 

2021   “Anne Marchand”, In the galleries by Mark Jenkins, The Washington Post, September 24, 2021.

"Anne Marchand, Moments of Grace", by Claudia Rousseau, East City Art, September 17, 2021.

“Woman’s National Democratic Club Presents Anne Marchand, Tellus/Caelus: Seeing Earth and Sky,” East City Art, February 22, 2021.

 

2020    "Stephanie Ann Roper Gallery Presents, Anne Marchand: Recent Abstractions," East City Arts March 2, 2020

 "Otherworldly Paintings on Exhibit in Roper Gallery," Cumberland Times-News February 22, 2020

 

2019  Mencia, Cecilia, "Anne Marchand, Organic, Zenith Gallery," DC Trending Magazine, Summer 2019

Mack, Tom, "Artist's recent abstractions showcased at the Morris," Aiken Standard February 21, 2019
ArtDaily, "Recent Abstractions by Anne Marchand," opens at the Morris Museum of Art" January 26, 2019

 
2018  Jenkins, Mark, “In the Galleries: Traveling Full Circle,” Washington Post December 2018
Clements, Michael, “3 Artists Following in the Footsteps of Legendary Sam Gilliam,“ 
Capitol File Magazine December 2018
Wilkins, Lorenzo, “ArtLife/LifeArt with Anne Marchand,” Video March 8, 2018
 
 
2017  Jenkins, Mark, “Show at American University invokes the ‘Eternal Feminine,’ Washington Post (cover reproduction) Dec 7, 2017 
Hartigan, Philip A., “A View From the Easel,“  Hyperallergic (cover reproduction) November 16, 2017 

Hauser, Andi, "Superfierce: Empowering Female Artists," WUSA9 TV October 2017

Washingtonian, "Superfierce Kicks Off Month-Long Interactive Exhibit of 30+ Fearless Female Artists" October 2017  

Goldberg, Claire, "Short But Sweet: Art of Legacy Pop-Up," Georgetown Voice (reproductions) April 2017  
Ryce, Walter, "A Carmel response to the Trump administration has D.C. connections," Monterey County Weekly Feb. 9, 2017  

 

2016   Magner, Jim, "Artist Revisit: Anne Marchand," Art and the City, The Hill Rag (reproductions) September 2016   

 

2015 "Placemaking Art, Anne Marchand, Westminster Playground Mural," CODA magazine, 2015 (reproductions)

 

2014   "Joseph Campbell, The Artists Way," Catalogue, Celadon Arts, 2014. pp. 28-29. (reproductions)
"New Exhibit, Into the Void," Porter Contemporary, Progressive Pulse, 2014. (Video Interview)
"Abstract Expressionism Revisited, Juror Anne Marchand in Dialogue, " The Art League Gallery 2014  

 

2013  Colucci, Emily, "Anne Marchand," ArtVoices Magazine, Winter. 2013, pp. 24-26. (cover, reproductions)
"Washington Art Matters: Art Life in the Capital 1940-1990," Washington Arts Museum, p. 164 2013 
Rousseau, Claudia, "The Essentials of Painting Seen in Three Local Exhibits," Gazette Post (reproduction) 2013  
"Pablo Picasso, 40 Years Later," Blouin Artinfo, Video feature (reproduction) 2013  
Landau, Lauren, "Acrylics, Wood Sculpture and Mixed Media at Blackrock," WAMU Art Beat, 2013
Jenkins, Mark, "Amy Lamb, Anne Marchand," The Washington Post, (reproduction) 2013  
Magner, Jim, "Anne Marchand, Evolve Urban Arts Project," The Hill Rag (reproductions) 2013  

Video
Virtual exhibition

Anne Marchand's Museum Exhibition Paintings

In Anne Marchand's museum exhibition paintings, paint appears in thick swaths, thin veils, rivulets, and in flows of enamel, ink, and acrylic. The interacting of differing viscosities forms liquid fields, reminiscent of weather systems and of biological growth. Marchand allows the poetic association in her paintings to arise naturally from the transit between above and below, the winding path, and the dissolving structure. There are the smaller incidents of patterned fabric, glass beads, along with stenciled words
and diagrammatic images. And enlivening everything is color, emerging in multifarious ways: like a blush in a cloud, a tint in water, a harmonic chord, or a glowing fire. There is a geometry underpinning the paintings, with a work's ground initially marked with a pencil, marker, or thread, breaking it into divisions. At times the surface is inscribed intuitively, after the paint is poured. Color is indispensable in achieving the emotional quality in the work. In the newest paintings, patterns are stenciled on the surface or in the printed fabrics that are overlaid with translucent paint.