Stephanie Roberts-Camello




Statement:
Assembling a history plays an important role in Stephanie’s encaustic relief paintings. In 2015 she found a bin of old family letters from the 20’s-40’s. They were written by members of her paternal family who were cowboys and farmers in West Texas. The letters reference the dust bowl and difficulty keeping cattle alive as well as the ongoing drought that decimated the farm lands. To make matters worse the Great Depression hit. Through experimenting with encaustic forms she found a relationship in the writing within the stress marks and layers. She began combining these letters with eco printing and rusted papers below the surface. Their stains, information and wear, reflect and inform the passing of time. Many layers of wax are applied and literally cover up the past. Encaustic as it cools retains every scrape and scar. These stress marks in the wax develop as it is being manipulated, and she saw this as a metaphor for the struggles in the letters and the endurance needed to survive the times. As a material, it has an innate feature for documentation. Seemingly destructive to the surface, the peeling plays a positive role as it reveals a small piece of history while other areas remain buried. It unearths a stratum of time much like the earth’s core.
The artist has recently added natural elements to her work such as found artist conk and shelf mushrooms and natural wood or roots to her organic shaped panels. Being a wild mushroom forager for years these natural recyclers add another element to the passing of time found in the letters and the layering.
Bio:
Stephanie has been awarded a residency twice at The Vermont Studio Center. Her list of solo and group shows is extensive throughout the East coast and for 10 years she showed at The Schoolhouse Gallery in Provincetown, MA. A few notable solo and curated shows were at The Cotuit Center for the Arts in Cotuit, MA., The Art Complex Museum in Duxbury, MA.,The Grimshaw Gudewicz Gallery at the Bristol Community College and an Invitational to the University gallery at Texas A & M University Commerce. The International Encaustic Conference in Provincetown awarded her with two separate scholarships to attend the Conference where she goes yearly. In addition to being a member of New England Wax, an organization of 30+ members from the 7 New England States who paint with Encaustic and cold wax, she was president of the group from 2021-2022. She has also been a gallery artist at the South Shore Art Center in Cohasset, MA. for over 20 years. Feature articles include: Artscope,The Surface Design Journal and The Cape Cod Times. Stephanie’s work is in many public and private collections including Meditech and Enkaustikos. Her art studio is in a rural woodland setting that is truly a nature preserve.
Website: stephanierobertscamello.com