Andrea Kowch (Symbolist painter) @andreakowch

Posted by: bluesyemre | May 16, 2019

Andrea Kowch (Symbolist painter) @andreakowch

Andrea Kowch has been described as “a powerful voice emerging, demonstrating a highly sensitive consciousness that informs a culturally-laced symbolism.” Born in Detroit, Michigan in 1986, she attended the College for Creative Studies through a Walter B. Ford II Scholarship, and graduated Summa Cum Laude with a BFA in 2009, double majoring in Illustration and Art Education. Her paintings and works on paper are rich in mood, allegory, and precision of medium, reflecting a wealth of influences from Northern Renaissance and American art to the rural landscapes and vernacular architecture of her native Michigan.

The stories and inspiration behind her paintings “stem from life’s emotions and experiences, resulting in narrative, allegorical imagery that illustrates the parallels between human experience and the mysteries of the natural world. The lonely, desolate American landscape encompassing the paintings’ subjects serves as an exploration of nature’s sacredness and a reflection of the human soul, symbolizing all things powerful, fragile, and eternal. Real yet dreamlike scenarios transform personal ideas into universal metaphors for the human condition, all retaining a sense of vagueness to encourage dialogue between art and viewer.”

The recipient of many honors early on in her young career, commencing in 2003, at age 17, with seven regional Gold Key awards and two national Gold Medal awards from the prestigious Scholastic Art and Writing Awards, her acceptance into these juried national exhibitions earned her representation at the Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. in 2003 and at the Diane von Furstenberg Gallery in New York in 2004. By 2005, she was granted a National ARTS in the Visual Arts Award from the National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts (now the National Young Arts Foundation), an honor that ranks recipients in the top 2% of American talent. The winning entries were exhibited at the Margulies Collection at the Warehouse, Miami. In 2008, Kowch received the Best of Show Purchase Award from the Northbrook Library’s annual juried international exhibition, and in the same year received an Illustration Faculty Award from the College for Creative Studies.

Kowch has since gone on to receive numerous other Best of Show awards in various juried exhibitions of regional, national, and international caliber, and has exhibited in several solo and group exhibitions at museums and galleries, including New York’s RJD Gallery, the Muskegon Museum of Art, where her solo retrospective Dream Fields debuted in 2013, the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) Jacksonville, the Grand Rapids Art Museum, ArtPrize, Art Basel Miami, the Los Angeles Art Show, ArtHamptons, and SCOPE NYC, who, in 2012, named Kowch one of the top 100 emerging artists in the world. She has also been featured in and graced the front covers of several national and international publications, including Spectrum, Direct Art, American Art Collector, CMYK, Revue, Womankind (AU), .Cent Magazine (UK), Hestitika (ITA), Hi-Fructose, and Southwest Art’s annual competition whose winners take center stage in their Emerging Artist Spotlight issue. Kowch’s work can be found in public collections, among them the Muskegon Museum of Art, Grand Rapids Art Museum, Northbrook Library, Northbrook, Illinois, and the Brooklyn Art Library, Brooklyn, New York; and in many significant private collections worldwide.

Kowch resides and works in Michigan where she paints full-time, and serves as an adjunct professor at the College for Creative Studies. She is represented exclusively by RJD Gallery in New York.