Abstract exhibit opens at CMC Gallery Oct. 12
By Debra Crawford
When Ellen Zagoras was 70, she looked at the 132 paintbrushes she’d accumulated over decades of working in other media. “I put a fortune into those brushes,” she says. “And I thought, ‘I could be dead before I use those things.’ So if not now, when, right?”
So she started painting, first using the brushes and then exploring other techniques, like using a tilt table. “Of course, I don’t use brushes at all when I paint now,” she says. “I pour it on and dump it on.”
Zagoras was a potter for 35 years, as well as a sculptor and maker of dichroic jewelry. Dichroic glass has multiple layers of metals or oxides, and modern versions of it grew out of NASA and the aeronautics industry. So it’s not surprising that some of her abstract paintings bear the influence of that medium, exploding in color and abstract in form, or that her Silt Mesa home of 18 years is often referred to as The Spaceship.
She says she never paints with rules, “because intuitively I know what to do.”
“I’m an alchemist,” she says. “I like to change the paint itself, see how it will behave. I use different chemicals, i.e., WD40, baking soda. I love water and how it moves. You name it, I put it in there.”
Nature, science, space motivate art
Zagoras is curious about physics, quantum mechanics and the natural phenomena of the universe, but it was an astronomy class in particular that most influenced her painting. She calls all of her paintings “Galaxy,” differentiated from each other only by a number.
A collection of her “Galaxy” paintings is on view at Colorado Mountain College’s ArtShare Gallery in downtown Glenwood Springs through Nov. 28. A free public opening is Oct. 12, from 6 to 8 p.m.
She says she thinks of painting as creating a new vision. “Gorky said, ‘Abstraction allows man to see with his mind what he cannot see with his eyes. It is an explosion or a mystery into unknown areas.’ ”
Now 78, Zagoras exudes enthusiasm for her art. She paints six hours a day, “if I can stop myself,” she says.
“I would like to encourage people to set aside time for any of the arts. I think sometimes people think ‘I can’t do it anymore.’ If you can show your children that you have a love and a passion, follow your bliss. That’s what’s important.”
The CMC ArtShare Gallery is open weekdays from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. For more information, call 947-8367 or visit cmcartshare.com.