Beth Ames Swartz (American, b. 1936) , "Shen Qi Series", 1998, mixed media and gold leaf on shaped

Beth Ames Swartz (American, b. 1936) , "Shen Qi Series", 1998, mixed media and gold leaf on shaped canvas, signed and dated lower right, 11 in. x 14 in., unframed. Note: Born in New York City, Beth Ames Swartz attended the High School of Music and Art and Cornell University. She also earned a master’s degree from New York University. Swartz moved to Arizona in 1959 and had a profound experience that changed the course of her artistic career. While on a rafting trip on the Colorado River, the colors and shapes of the area began to awaken in her a sense of connectedness with the Earth - that the Earth was feminine and what it meant to be feminine in the world. Swartz had been introduced to action painting and was making the transition to becoming an abstract artist. With this experience in mind, she began to work on incorporating elements into abstract art that she thought had been missing - louder female voices and a true philosophy of inclusion. Drawing inspiration from Betty Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique and Carol Christ’s Diving Deep and Surfacing along with the artworks of Wassily Kandinsky and Mark Rothko, she aimed to invoke the history of female empowerment and add feminine discourse to her paintings. The imbalance that exists between the masculine and the feminine in modern culture and restoring that balance became a key element of her work.Swartz found resonance of her beliefs while studying various philosophical ideas and world religions, specifically Carl Jung, the Cabala, Buddhism, the Shen Qi and various Native American cultures. Her process became more about “…communication with viewers on both a conscious and an unconscious level” and using the commonalities of philosophy and religion to form a spiritual bond that all people would recognize. Her body of work does have visual elements that unify it, including electric color fields influenced by Arizona, rich textures, collage, impasto and the use of written words. However, concept and inspiration link her work more than a single visual style. In referring to her art specifically she notes: “Connections…connections between faith and art…connections with Mother Earth… I focus on art’s potential for unifying people, helping us recognize the commonality of human experience.” Swartz’ work has been the subject of numerous one-woman shows dating to 1981 and is included in important private and public collections. Ref.: Alami, Emani. “Reviving the Divine Feminine with Beth Ames Swartz.” Patheos. www.patheos.com. Aug. 4, 2022. Accessed Mar. 3, 2023.
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