Abigail Crow comes from a family of artists including a father with an international following. And while this afforded countless fond experiences and an appreciation for the arts, for some children of successful artists, it can be a challenge to create a name for themselves. Not for Abigail though.
At a young age, she figured out the subject matter she was passionate about exploring, and she wasn’t afraid to deviate from the classic style she was trained on in college. This led her to experiment with different mediums in search of a way to bring more dimension to her work. She eventually found that dimension with glass.
As she tested the waters painting in oil on glass––using the front and back to create layers––something surprising happened: the pieces started to sell. Realizing how much she loved the process, Abigail knew she was on to something. Over the years, as she’s honed her process, she has progressed from glass to lucite, which allows her to create larger-scale pieces and test different approaches.
Abigail’s work is a beautiful blend of contemporary and classic, contemplative, yet fun––and it’s the dimension and layers that enable her to create this synergistic combination.
Q&A with Abigail Crow
When did you know art was your calling?
I grew up in a family of artists and it’s something I’ve always been interested in. There’s nothing quite like getting into the flow of a painting. It’s like poetry. It feels spontaneous and exciting, and I never quite know how a painting is going to turn out. And I love that experience of creating something and giving back to the world.
The more I painted and learned about the profession of my dad and my sister, the more I fell in love with it. And I’ve been basically doing it my whole life and doing it professionally for the last four years.
How did you develop your unique style?
I’ve always painted in oil. I was trained classically in college to paint and draw, so I learned how to create that way. However, I felt like I needed more dimension in my work. So I started painting on glass. At first, it was just on these little glass frames that you can get from Ikea. Those started to sell, and I really enjoyed finding a new way to approach oil painting.
Since then, I’ve progressed to painting on lucite, which is an acrylic glass, and that allows me to create large-scale pieces and it opens up all sorts of avenues for how to approach the painting I want to create. So it’s something I think I’ll be doing for a very long time.
To create it, I paint on the front and the backside. So for example, I might paint the highlights and details of a face on the front, and then the hair and the background color are on the back, appearing to recede. It’s a fun process. It’s a lot of back and forth. Some of it’s reversed, some of it’s done on the front, but it creates this luminous and dimensional effect that I find really intriguing.
How do you keep yourself challenged?
In college, my thesis, or final project, was portraiture. I loved it. It challenged me because figures and people are some of the hardest things that you can paint. I also wanted to get better at doing flowers and more botanical elements, so I started approaching my work as portraits of people and flora and fauna.
I love being able to combine my passion of art and nature together. So you’ll see in a lot of my work, different botanical elements like lovebirds or roadrunners, lemons and oranges. It’s really just such a joy to be able to be up close with such beautiful natural things. There’s always so much variety, so I can challenge myself to say, ‘Ok, today I’m going to try painting a cactus wren. Let’s see how this works. Or, today I’m going to figure out how to do apple blossoms.’ The sky’s the limit. There are so many things I want to try.
What do you love most about creating art?
I think the most rewarding aspect is being able to share it with people who understand what this is. It’s a special thing to know that someone not only admires my work, but that they also want to take it and have it be part of their home. I feel that the home is meant to be a sacred place. It’s meant to be a place of respite. And if I can contribute to somebody’s home that’s a very special and sacred thing. It’s very much an honor for me to be able to contribute to the joy that they have in their home.
What brought you to the Celebration of Fine Art?
My dad has done this show for about 14 years, so I grew up coming here. I remember as a little girl visiting him from Utah. It’s always been a very fond memory for me to be here in Scottdale because I’d get to see him and get to see art and get out of the snow. Then the more I learned about it as a professional, the more I was intrigued by the connections and the relationships that you develop here. I’m excited to be in one of the best places in the world to sell art. It still feels surreal that I’m here because I’ve been wanting to be a part of this for so long, and it’s been part of our family for so long.