Kathryn Lynch (LA)

"From surrounding waterways to the dissecting city streets of Manhattan and Brooklyn, Lynch illuminates scenes that are both metaphor and balm for the passing of time. Hovering between realism and abstraction she presents urban scenes that typically flash by in the corner of the commuter’s eye. Usually fleeting moments of our outer world are paused and rendered through Lynch’s inner world of gentle poetic gravity. Boats bopping on the Hudson, a portrait of a lone skyscraper, the subway rumbling across its highest bridge, or streets abuzz with city lights, Lynch’s canvases tap into the unconscious looking to reveal the solitary explorer in each of us - the inner author of our unique stories between the streets."

This year hardworking panelists Julia Whitney Barnes (Dutchess), Franklin Evans (New York), Elliot Green (Columbia), Sarah McCoubrey (Onondaga), and Mie Yim (Kings) selected the The New York Foundation for the Arts painting fellowship recipients from a staggeringly large pool of 3,071 applicants. Each artist will receive a cash grant of $7,000, and the three finalists — Jordan Casteel, Clayton Schiff, and Don Voisine — will each receive prestige and a few other benefits, but no funding. In the 32 years that NYFA has been awarding the fellowships, $31 million has been distributed, which sounds like a lot until you consider the economic benefits artists have brought to so many New York communities over the years. The state should consider expanding the program. Here are images and links for the 2018 NYFA grant recipients, some thoughts about the selection, and a bit of advice for painters who didn’t receive funding this year.

Kathryn Lynch featured on 1stdibs.com Introspective Magazine