Shara Hughes
Invented landscapes in colours that do not occur outdoors, painted from nowhere in particular.
Shara Hughes was born in Atlanta in 1981, studied at the Rhode Island School of Design, and worked for years on interiors before turning outward around 2011 to the landscapes that made her name. She calls them psychological rather than observed: there is no site, nothing is painted from life, and the trees, water and skies arrive through the process of painting itself, in acid pinks, oranges and greens, with a different technique — pour, scrape, stain, dry brush, thick impasto — in almost every passage. She was included in the 2017 Whitney Biennial and works in Brooklyn.
A strong and fast-moving market since the late 2010s, led by large unique canvases; the framing device Hughes often paints around the edge of the picture is part of the work and should not be cropped or covered by a mount. Because she combines oil, acrylic, dye, spray and airbrush in one surface, the layers age at different rates and any past varnishing is a real problem — these should not be varnished. Works on paper are numerous. Print editions are relatively few and are published in small numbers.
If you own a work by Shara Hughes
Send photographs and whatever paperwork came with it. The first question is what the work actually is — edition or unique, when, and in what condition — because everything else follows from the answer. A valuation costs nothing and commits you to nothing.
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