Wide Spaces

Jennifer Stenberg

March 2010

In Wide Spaces Jennifer Stenberg’s paintings are nothing if not rhythmic. Creating landscapes with pronounced horizontal axes, the Flesherton artist applies the linearity of her prairie upbringing to a rural Ontario subject.
The extension of her works is marked in many cases by fences that are strikingly monumental as they follow the paths and divide up the fields of her paintings. The wide canvases are the perfect place to establish a balanced sense of movement across the landscape. When there are no fences, as in Morning Mist on the Water, Stenberg finds other ways to break up her wide frames. Her sense of light, in this painting especially, is so accomplished that her limited palette affords a strong impact to a rather mundane subject. The painting becomes a study of the colour green without once becoming heavy: the grass remains light and sensual throughout. In this case it is the light itself that provides a variation in the rhythms of the waving grass. Likewise in Line of Light, the artist finds moments of transcendence at the very edge of the visual field. Instead of identifying one particular object to focus on, Stenberg invites the eye to follow the light as it moves across the wide spaces of the world.

Growing up on the prairies, Jennifer moved about during her early professional career as a journalist and graphic designer. In 2000, Stenberg moved to the artistic community of Flesherton, and it was here that she was first inspired to begin painting. In collaboration with other artists, she was instrumental in the formation of the Heard House Gallery, Left Side Gallery, and Squatters Gallery. With 10 years in Grey County under her belt, Jennifer’s paintings exhibit a strong connection to the place she has come to call home.