Maud Taber-Thomas
Maud Taber-Thomas is a passionate scholar of classic literature, an avid classical musician, an eager European traveler, and an aficionado of past time periods, Maud Taber-Thomas interweaves all of these interests into her artwork. Trained in academic painting techniques, Maud's artistic process is strongly tied to the skills employed by artists from past generations, from the Renaissance Tenebrists, to the French Rococo painters, to the Pre-Raphaelites and the Impressionist portraitists. Working in miniature, on a larger-than-life scale, and every size in between, Maud endows all of her works with a sense of the fleeting nature of light, a celebration of color, and a sympathetic and tranquil sense of peace and thoughtfulness. Many of her works feature sensitive portraits that evoke the complex inner life of her subjects, hinting at stories that transcend the single moment depicted in a visual artwork. Maud's drawings and paintings exist within a peaceful conversation between the many art forms that she loves.
Educated at the New York Academy of Art, Bowdoin College, and Oxford University, she now lives in the Washington, DC area. She teaches at the National Gallery of Art and the Yellow Barn Studio.She lives in Silver Spring, Maryland and teaches drawing and painting classes at the National Gallery of Art and the Yellow Barn Studio at Glen Echo. Her drawings and paintings have been shown at a number of galleries in the Washington, DC area and in New York.
For her most recent show at Susan Calloway Fine Arts, Maud created artworks inspired by such authors as William Shakespeare, Henry James, Stella Gibbons, Charlotte Bronte, Jane Austen, Vita Sackville-West, and Oscar Wilde. Her works particularly feature strong women from literature. A selection of miniature paintings on the backs of New York City Metrocards were also available, which feature a range of portraits, landscapes and cityscapes, and still lifes.
ARTIST STATEMENT
Shakespeare's sonnet, "If music and sweet poetry agree," highlights the beautiful bond between two seemingly separate art forms, music and poetry. In the spirit of Shakespeare, I create luminous drawings and paintings that embody a loving conversation between several different art forms. My paintings tell the stories that I discover in Victorian and Medieval literature, capture the vibrant light and color of far-off places and distant time periods, and weave together symbols in compositions reminiscent of polyphonic music.