The Ground Up
We get the dirt on La Mesa artist Gail Roberts, from flower buds to bold canvases blowing up at OMA
by AnnaMaria Stephens
G
ail Roberts had no idea what she was in for when she decided to paint everything that blooms in the sprawling garden outside her home studio in La Mesa. Not just the decorative flowers planted for their showy good looks, but the fruit trees, vegetables, succulents, and weeds. “It was a daunting task,” says Roberts.“I still have two tables of photographs I want to paint.” Even so, Gail Roberts: Color Fields , showing now at Oceanside Museum of Art through November 27, makes a dazzling collection. Set in a precise grid pattern, the 130 equally scaled oil paintings are arranged by color in spectrum order. The show’s name is a playful nod to the mid-century color field style of abstract painting (Mark Rothko, Helen Frankenthaler) and to the meticulous rows of cultivated color at places like the Carlsbad Flower Fields. “My work has always been about my immediate environment,” says Roberts, who’s spent the last 15 years tilling granite-laden soil and planting her garden across a half acre of fertile land.“I come to have a deep understanding because I stay focused on what’s close to me.”
CLOCKWISE FROM LEFT: La Mesa artist Gail Roberts painted flowers from her garden with painstaking, breathtaking detail. The resulting exhibit, Color Fields , is showing at Oceanside Museum of Art.
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AUGUST 2022
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