BIOGRAPHY
Carol Cassel Baker is an artist working mostly in oil paint or pastel. Having grown up in Indianapolis, her home and studio have long been in Maplewood, NJ. Baker holds an MFA in Painting from Pratt Institute, a BFA in Painting from the Herron School of Art / Indiana University and studied Art and Art History at Purdue University. She studies portraiture through Continuing Education at SVA in NYC. Baker is a retired teacher and former illustrator.

2016 Children’s Book: I Want to Go Outside to Play!! by: Teresita Blake Kellenyi
Recently:
2022 Solo Exhibition: Mostly Portraits at SVACE , NYC
2021 Feature Article: “Orchestrated Color” The Portraits of Carol Cassel Baker
The Artists Magazine, July/August 2021 – Written by: John A. Parks
Carol Cassel Baker exhibits her work in multiple juried shows. See CV.

ARTIST STATEMENT

Generally, my artwork is about color, light, spacial relationships and their impact upon one another. I prefer to work from life, composing simultaneously with drawing, color and elaborated connections among objects and surfaces. Each painting is a personal translation and reinterpretation of the rhythms, harmonies and tensions I perceive among real objects within an actual environment.

Frequent visits to dear friends in Mystic, CT prompted my Stones of Stonington Series, begun mostly en plein air. Multitudes of rocks and glacial deposits are used to construct buildings and walls, while most seem ‘littered’ about! They are everywhere!

I came upon James Turrell’s Skyspace, Within Without, at the National Gallery in Canberra, Australia. It was stunning to discover this 3-D physical structure that embodied many of the formal considerations I explore in my own 2-D drawings and paintings: pictorially ambiguous spaces created with color, light, varied surfaces and recognizable elements. I took dozens of reference photos from this thrilling visual experience!

Regarding portraiture, human faces tell a human story. I want to paint flesh with sensual, descriptive color while capturing a strong likeness of the model. With that said, it’s the interplay of color, light and composition I find most intriguing. My goal is to convey a palpable human relatability with the subject, as well as to produce a formally powerful painting.