JD Wellborn
J.D. Wellborn’s newest series titled Mystical Tablets explores a connection between ancient motifs and contemporary techniques. Mandalas, petroglyphs, ancient coins and artifacts in archeological sites found on her trips to Guatemala and Peru inspired these unique creations. The paintings are achieved through a woven technique of layering delicate papers, with canvas, fiberglass material. The culmination of this layering becomes a very beautiful & sturdy surface reminiscent of tin tiles or leather.
Purple Prose Tablet
Pura Vida
Autumnal Glow
Autumn Dream Tablet
Mystical Tablet 1719
Mystical Tablet 1725
Mystical Tablet 1740
Mystical Tablet 1749
Mystical Tablet 1761
Mystical Tablet 1752
Mystical Tablet 1762
Mystical Tablet 1772
Mystical Tablet 1773
Mystical Tablet 1774
Mystical Tablet 1775
Mystical Tablet 1781
Mystical Tablet 1783
Mystical Tablet 1784
Mystical Tablet 1785
Mystical Tablet 1786
Mystical Tablet 1788
Mystical Tablet 1789
Mystical Tablet 1790
Mystical Tablet 1791
Mystical Tablet 1794
Mystical Tablet 1795
Mystical Tablet 1797
Mystical Tablet 1798
Mystical Tablet 1799
Mystical Tablet 1800
Mystical Tablet 1801
Mystical Tablet 1802
Mystical Tablet 1803
Mystical Tablet 1804
Mystical Tablet 1805
Mystical Tablet 1806
Mystical Tablet 1807
Orange Pattern Landscape
Periwinkle Dotted Landscape
Sienna Reds Landscape
Green Gold Landscape
Rust Landscape
Green Glaze Landscape
Orange with Landscape
Lavendar Landscape
Coral Swirl Landscape
Red Swirl Landscape
Bronze Landscape
Turquoise Firefly Landscape
Gold Green Landscape
Green Illumination Landscape
Soft Green Landscape

J.D. WELLBORN
EDUCATION:
BFA University of New Mexico
Artist Statement:
My work is aimed at creating diverse patterns by varying my treatments of a common format of materials and shapes. I start by constructing a paper and cloth grid, with the paper torn into small pieces. That gives the flat border surfaces an undulating shape that viewers often sense as metallic or stone-like. These ever-different surfaces open up a wide spectrum of possibilities for free and energetic painting.
Each painting has a center that allows me to pursue my basic urge to work from the outer boundaries toward the core. The grid-and-center format provides balance as I begin by painting chaos and then impose order on what seems to be formless turbulence.
That initial phase gives me the base for playing with colors, that is, by layering many hues of thick paint and sanding the impasto/ built-up areas back from time to time, producing unanticipated combinations of texture and colors that render depth. During that process, I start building glazes of very thin coats of paint, with goal of reaching harmonies of color, tint, and hue across the spectrum.
Striving to make the paints thick and plaster-like, I mix acrylic paint, gels and medium with plaster materials and pigments obtained on trips to Guatemala and Peru and the resulting raised surfaces on the pieces are almost always made of paper and thick paint which I manipulate in different ways.
As I work on multiple pieces at the same time, I often find a color or texture that works on one piece can be applied to another. Rather than planning ahead, I react to the new and evolving surface. Working back and forth keeps the work fluid and prevents the flow of work from being held up by a purely linear sequence of effort. Another advantage of working on many pieces simultaneously is that finished paintings look good in groupings.