Linda Burke December Artist of the Month

"Internal Landscapes" Exhibit By Linda Burke to be Featured at Dover Library in December

Needham High School Art Teacher is Artist of the Month

Teaching art at Needham High School for the past 15 years, artist Linda Burke has fostered many a talent. Recently, she has been able to focus on a talent closer to home: her own. The result of her labor is an exhibit titled "Internal Landscapes", which will be on display at the Dover Library December 1-31. Burke will also host an opening reception at the library on December 10 from 6-8 p.m.

Burke's pieces are large in size for watercolor. She then alters the watercolor surface with mark-making, using drawing media such as charcoal, Conte crayon colored pencils and pastel.

"With watercolor and mixed drawing media, I explore the mark-making process as it is affected but emotional and psychological moments," said Burke. "The work is then approached with no preconceived goals, which allows for experiences, memories, or the timbre of the day to impact the color, motion and line."

The artist said that while one piece may be influenced by a tragic event, other could be collections of ethereal impressions.

"Essentially, my work is a gestalt art process, influenced by Chinese brush painting artists and modern Abstract Expressionists, like Joan Snyder,"she added. "I begin with large physical brushwork and then pull out imagery based on internal dialog and what I see emerging naturally from the paper surface."

After focusing on teaching for so many years, Burke returned to her own craft when she moved to Ashland five years ago and began painting at the Danforth Museum. She currently works in Michael Dowling's Medicine Wheel Studios in South Boston. 

The Artist of the Month program is sponsored by the Friends of the Dover Library. Each month, a different local artist's work is displayed in the library. Pieces are available for sale and 10 percent of all sales go to the library.