Freya Grand Portfolios

PROCESS - OUT IN THE FIELD AND IN THE STUDIO
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The work begins with preparations to reach places that are remote, wild and vast, drawing on my years of experience hiking in a wide range of environments. Some sights can only be reached by hours of ascent and I prepare myself and my tools for the journey. The work of the climb, the occasional doubt about the trail, the weather - all of these physical sensations frame the impact of the visual discovery.

From a height, with unmarked terrain as far as the eye can see, there is only the temperature, the sound of the wind, the silence.

Over the course of a day the weather may shift, rain may come and go, fog may obscure the landscape. This unpredictability is inherent to the experience and I welcome the opportunity to see ancient land-forms under changing conditions.

The visual discoveries along the way are the reward. The memory of what it took to get there becomes inseparably linked with the feeling of being there.

Over the years of working in remote places, I have learned how to preserve these sensory memories, to retain the most elemental aspects of my experience. In my journals I record my impressions in both drawings and words. I do small watercolors if the weather permits. I take photographs.

When I return to my studio after a journey I reassemble my notes and sketches and develop larger preparatory drawings. Here I can work at a large scale, a scale that reflects the vastness of what I have seen and allows me to fill the viewer's field of vision, to immerse them in an emotional experience that I seek to share.

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PROCESS - OUT IN THE FIELD AND IN THE STUDIO

PROCESS - OUT IN THE FIELD AND IN THE STUDIO
________________________________________________________________________

The work begins with preparations to reach places that are remote, wild and vast, drawing on my years of experience hiking in a wide range of environments. Some sights can only be reached by hours of ascent and I prepare myself and my tools for the journey. The work of the climb, the occasional doubt about the trail, the weather - all of these physical sensations frame the impact of the visual discovery.

From a height, with unmarked terrain as far as the eye can see, there is only the temperature, the sound of the wind, the silence.

Over the course of a day the weather may shift, rain may come and go, fog may obscure the landscape. This unpredictability is inherent to the experience and I welcome the opportunity to see ancient land-forms under changing conditions.

The visual discoveries along the way are the reward. The memory of what it took to get there becomes inseparably linked with the feeling of being there.

Over the years of working in remote places, I have learned how to preserve these sensory memories, to retain the most elemental aspects of my experience. In my journals I record my impressions in both drawings and words. I do small watercolors if the weather permits. I take photographs.

When I return to my studio after a journey I reassemble my notes and sketches and develop larger preparatory drawings. Here I can work at a large scale, a scale that reflects the vastness of what I have seen and allows me to fill the viewer's field of vision, to immerse them in an emotional experience that I seek to share.