Veronica Barker-Barzel has “always been a painter in some sense,” an identity that clearly comes across in her printmaking. She got her start in printmaking twelve years ago, and quite early on she sought to synthesize the two mediums of printmaking and painting. Veronica states that she first “fell in love with the process” itself, and then learned to express her ideas and emotions through her subjects.
Her recent works expand into mixed-media sculpture—she is currently working on a collage piece that synthesizes items like memorabilia, cigarette cases, and old boxes that serve as an homage to the memory of an historical building. Today, Veronica’s prints center around the mythological, in particular creatures and themes that she has encountered through her extensive travels throughout Europe and Asia.
Veronica’s journey through printmaking as a medium is defined by rich patterns, cultivating joy, and creating a sense of wonder. Whether working on a woodblock poster for a local arts festival or building on her recurring theme of the jackalope, her goal remains the same: to bring a healing factor to her audience. She likes to play in the abstract— the idea of playfulness certainly comes through in her whirling patterns, whimsical subjects, and bold colors.
Veronica was put off by the “cleanness” and sterility of life in the United States, she feels that the rich and mystical traditions of countries such as Spain, Italy, and Japan bridge gaps through time to bring “spirit beings” into modern life. Thus, this idea of a healing factor in her art is one that connects people through time and within this feeling of joy and wonder.
Going forward, Veronica plans to continue to build upon these themes. She is driven by her own intuition, as she simply does “what the paper tells me to do.” In terms of her practical process, Veronica hopes to continue to push herself out of her comfort zone by working with a larger variety of colors, in particular moving from her current use of blues into more reds, oranges, yellows. Overall, she wants to keep growing and to keep challenging herself—whether she continues to work with the motif of jackalope or continues to include other mystical creatures, her work will certainly inspire, in her own words, “dancing in the festival of life.”