Laura crehUet berman

ARTIST STATEMENT

This ongoing series of small paintings on paper began in 2015, during a time of personal transition marked by the birth of my youngest child. While my studio was under renovation, I transformed the bathroom next to my infant’s bedroom into an improvised workspace. I painted late at night, between feedings—often between 1:00 and 3:00 am—creating quietly and instinctively, without imposed rules. Over the course of a year, this nocturnal practice resulted in more than 100 small, iterative works.

What began as an intimate and adaptive painting routine has since become a generative force in my broader practice. The discoveries made through this body of work continue to inform my approaches to printmaking and collage, often guiding the imagery I choose to explore on a larger scale in my printed works.

These paintings reflect my enduring fascination with geology—how immense forms in the natural world are shaped by countless small actions over long periods of time. Through the layering of color, form, and texture, I build visual patterns that explore connections between time, labor, play, and discovery. The vibrancy and beauty in the work are deliberate; they act as invitations, heightening the viewer’s sense of exploration and the promise of possibility.

ARTIST BIO

Laura Crehuet Berman is a Spanish-American artist. She is a Professor at the Kansas City Art Institute, teaching in the Printmaking Department since 2002, and in 2024 she was a Fulbright Senior Scholar at the University of Canberra, Australia. Berman has exhibited in over 150 exhibitions internationally and her works are widely collected. She works with six galleries in the United States and she has a longstanding publishing relationship with Pele Prints in St. Louis. Berman has worked as an artist-in-residence at Anderson Ranch (USA), Frans Masereel Centrum (Belgium), Megalo Print Studios (Australia), and Can Serrat Artist Center (Spain), among others, and she has been a visiting artist and lecturer at over 50 institutions around the world, including the 2024 Printopia Festival in Auckland, New Zealand. Her work has been featured in the books Contemporary American Printmakers, Printmaking at the Edge, A Survey of Contemporary Printmaking, An Artist and A Mother, Do More Art: Print, and Color Theory: A Critical Introduction.