Kathryn Markel Fine Arts is pleased to present Jeepers Creepers, a solo exhibition featuring new paintings and works on paper by Diane Ayott.

A compulsive layering of patterns dominates Ayott’s work, created with dots, dashes, lines, slashes, circles, ovals and loops. She uses anything on hand to stamp out a layer of marks, such as plastic bottle caps or a lid to jar, rolling, scraping, brushing and squeezing paint into various layers. The accrual of repetitive marks creates a dense quilt of patterns that weave in and out of each other. Eventually, a skewed image grows organically from her process of loose patterning. She shifts between balance and distortion, remaining conscious of space, volume, texture and other formal elements.

In her recent work, Ayott has intensified the combinations of colors she employs, creating more spatial depth within her images. The incorporation of bright, vibrating colors shimmer in space, enhancing both the power and playfulness of the work. Combining such saturated colors with the sensuality of her detailed layering activates the surface with a buzzing, charismatic energy.

A crucial part of Ayott's studio practice is spent with a notebook and a dictionary. She uses titles to hint at narrative and describe mood. There is a sense that the work is both serious and curious, expressing the emotional and logical qualities of accumulating thoughts while fleshing out the meaning by way of repetition. As viewers we read layers as the overall color palette, and then closer up, small bits of distinct information reveal themselves; we get lost in visually picking apart each distinct pattern and color, discovering the pieces that created the whole.

Diane Ayott is a professor in painting and foundations at Montserrat College of Art. She has had one-person exhibitions in museums and galleries throughout the Northeast. She received her MFA from the Massachusetts College of Art and currently lives and works in Boston.