Leaden Sky, oil on canvas
-Lorrie, we'd love to hear your story and how you got to where you are today, both personally and as an artist.
My love of nature and my desire to live by the ocean has definitely been the greatest influence in my life and work. Growing up in the New England countryside, I spent most of my time as a child outdoors. Riding my horse, I would disappear for hours adventuring into the surrounding fields and woods. Summers were spent on Cape Cod swimming in the ocean or patrolling the dunes. Eventually, after graduating from college, working in the field of architecture and interior design and a decade of city living in Boston and then New York City, I found my way back to the shores of the Cape where I currently live and paint. All of my youth having been spent amid nature left an indelible impression on me and has greatly inspired my work as a seascape and landscape painter.
Ocean Nocturne, oil on canvas
-You describe the outer beach as your “creative workshop,” and it’s such a vivid image. How does that solitude support your practice, and are there times when working alone presents its own challenges?
The outer beach is definitely my “creative workshop.” I enjoy hikes along the coast, often walking for miles. It’s transformative. Breathing in the salt air clears my mind, fueling my creativity. I’m also very fortunate to have built a detached studio on my property that overlooks the Herring River marshland of the Cape Cod National Seashore. I prefer working alone, getting lost in the process. I always work accompanied by music, or if the time of year is right, I open the sliding doors listening to the sounds of the hawks whistling as they fly over the marsh. Painting in my studio is a wonderful form of active meditation for me.
Night Sea, oil on canvas
-Working with thick impasto, dripping paint, and natural tools brings an element of risk and spontaneity into your process. How do you decide when to control the moment and when to let the materials take over? Have there been moments where that uncertainty led to an unexpected breakthrough?
Spontaneity and risk certainly find their way into my work. Exploring how to achieve a more abstract and intuitive interpretation of the seascape or landscape soon led to many unexpected breakthroughs. I began incorporating more gestural brushwork, thick impasto and dripping paint to interpret the movement of the sea and sky. My preference to paint with larger brushes prevents the image from becoming too precious. Once I begin overthinking the process or trying to control the moment, the painting stalls and loses its dynamic energy. I will often scratch into the wet oil paint with a shard of broken shell or a driftwood stick that I’ve found along the shore, breaking up the tension of the surface. The serendipity of dripping paint naturally lends itself to the watery quality of a seascape. Ultimately the painting should feel spontaneous and expressive, rather than serve as a detailed representation.
Thunder Struck, oil on canvas
-Your paintings have a beautiful sense of atmosphere, as if the landscape is breathing. When you’re walking the shore and absorbing the shifts in light and weather, how much of your painting is about capturing what you see versus what you feel or imagine?
I like the image of the “breathing landscape.” I want my paintings to feel like visual poetry. I strive to capture the feeling of the sky's and the ocean’s intensity or serenity, emphasizing emotion over realism, I’m not interested in simply reinterpreting a photographic image from the scene. My objective is for the viewer to experience the painting profoundly, emotionally, whether it be an intense reaction to a foreboding sea or sky or a more meditative, peaceful resolve if the scene is more ethereal in nature.
Storm Force, oil on canvas
-What's the best way for someone to check out your work and provide support?
To check out my Seascape and Landscape paintings:
You can visit my website: www.lorrielapointe.com.
Follow me on Instagram: @lorrielapointe.
I enjoy engaging with clients at my studio in Wellfleet, Cape Cod, MA.
To arrange an appointment, contact me by email: lorrielapointe@gmail.com.
Statement
As a painter living and working in Wellfleet, I draw my inspiration from the natural surroundings on the outer shores of the Cape. The repetition of my footsteps over the sand and the cadence of the waves crashing along the shore are the elemental rhythm to which my thoughts unfold. This lonely stretch of outer beach is my creative workshop. Here I find artistic energy, tease out tangled thoughts and break through creative roadblocks. Inspiration may present itself wrapped in a thick blanket of winter fog, tumbling along stormy waves, or afloat upon the mirrored surface of a quiet sea.
All of these dreamlike images inform my work. I reinterpret them to evoke an emotional response. My chosen medium is oil paint. I often layer the canvas with thick impasto and dripping paint. I might make marks upon the surface with broken shards of shells, or with driftwood sticks I find along the shoreline. The ever-changing peninsula is a constant source of ideas.
I maintain a studio in Wellfleet, where I live with my husband, Bob, and daughter, Sasha. For over 30 years we have farmed Fox Island Oyster Company, our six-acre shellfish grant cultivating oysters and clams. Art runs in the family. Bob is a figurative artist and Sasha a fine artist and ceramicist.
Windswept Shore, oil on canvas
Bio
Wild Wave, oil on canvas
Lorrie La Pointe grew up in rural Connecticut. She studied at the Boston Architectural Center and Parsons School of Design/The New School where she received her degree. Her work is in the permanent collection of The Cape Museum of Art, Yale New Haven Hospital, Bridgeport Hospital and numerous private collections. She is a signature member of the National Association of Women Artists.