Beth Livensperger

Lives and works in Ridgewood, NY

Artist statement

As an artist, I make both small oil paintings, and room-scale installations that feature large wall paintings and hangings. New oil paintings depict environments in which characters wander, lounge, and gaze. The color is highly charged, and the ocean - to my mind - is not entirely benign. The faceless, marionette-like quality of the figures, points to the queasy disconnect I perceive in myself and others I know between our lives of privilege, and the convulsive turmoil of much of the globe. I have been very interested in a method of layering colors, then removing paint to partially reveal prior layers. My most recent installation (2025) foregrounded imagery from various corners of contemporary life. I painted the ocean, cars, greyhounds, an oil tanker, school desks, and Greek columns. These subjects were chosen intuitively and were meant to relate loosely to each other. For me, they foster thoughts of global commerce, transportation, competition (via the greyhounds and the classroom desks), and our national fights over the past (the columns). Underlying everything is the idea of wandering through the world and taking in our strange mix of the natural and artificial.

Artwork