A Portrait of the Artist: Linda Sherman

Linda Sherman won first place in watercolor in the juried 25th Annual Spring Gaithersburg Fine Arts Association (GFAA) Show on view at Kentlands Mansion through the end of May 2011. Her larger-than-life portrait of her friend Jim zooms in on Jim's face and captures the tranquility of his features through a unique and challenging composition. Sherman's other accepted entry in the show "Joyful Potful" is a group of red flowers, also rendered on a large sheet of watercolor paper.

"I treat flowers the same way I would treat a portrait. I just look for an interesting composition. I take a lot of photographs, and often times, I translate the cropping directly from the photo onto paper," said Sherman who has an intuitive sense for subjects and perspectives that appeal to her artistic sensibility.

Although she paints a lot of flowers and plants, Sherman's other subjects include still life and portraits.

"I am definitely interested in doing more portraits," said the artist who has mastered her preferred medium - watercolor. Even, immaculate washes of vibrant and earth tones dominate her paintings, and her subject matter emanates from the paper with unequivocal realism, while the artist's hand is ever-present in the reception of the total work of art.

"I love the transparent quality of the watercolor medium. Art is my personal visual expression of my reaction to people, nature and the sunlight, which brings energy and form to everything it touches. I hope to engage the viewer in the beauty of what seems to be the ordinary and to consider it in a new way," said the artist in her artist's statement.

Sherman drew profusely when she was a young child. She still likes to work with colored pencils. She began painting relatively recently in 1996 after taking her first watercolor painting class with Susan Herron, a member of the Baltimore Watercolor Society. Sherman is also a member. Sherman is also a member of the Potomac Valley Watercolorists and the Texas Watercolor Society.

Her work is currently on display in Alexandria, Virginia at Green Springs Gardens, the Mid-Atlantic Baltimore Watercolor Society show at Strathmore Hall in Bethesda, Maryland and Kentlands Mansion in Gaithersburg, Maryland. In the past she has shown with the Texas Watercolor Society as well as the Rockville Art League. Her work has also been on display at the Ratner Museum in Bethesda, Maryland and the Chloe's Coffee Gallery in Gaithersburg, Maryland.

"I have often won first and second place awards with both the Rockville Art League and the Gaithersburg Fine Arts Association, as well as the Baltimore Watercolor Society," reported Sherman.

With a keen eye for close-ups, Sherman studied photography in the 1970s at George Washington University in Washington, DC.

"I spent a lot of time in the darkroom because it was all film back then. Now I carry around a digital camera everywhere I go. I have enough subject matter to last me all my life from the photos I have taken," she said.

Although she has studied the work of some photographers, her favorites are American painters Andrew Wyeth, Winslow Homer and Georgia O'Keefe who was married to photographer Alfred Stieglitz.

From a class she took with David Daniels at Montgomery College, Sherman understood the value of innovation in art.

"Apart from the steady routine that taking a class provides, Daniels's class also exposed me to new ways of working. We had an assignment each week and got to experiment with incorporating black ink in watercolor painting, pointilism, applying an even colorful wash and taking away the white of the paper, as well as applying texture to the paper by crinkling it."

These techniques provided new insight into the watercolor medium for Sherman who generally does not apply white gouache to render the lightest lights in her works but uses the white of the paper to achieve these effects.

Despite her love of painting, Sherman devotes herself to other endeavors as well. She is recently licensed real estate agent and works for Long and Foster in Maryland and a part time employee of the Arts Barn in Gaithersburg. She also serves as a crossing guard at DuFief Elementary School on school days.

"I would love to paint all the time," said Sherman whose modesty belies her entrancing talent and vision.