Painting show opens at Ulla Surland Gallery Eleven in Fairfield Saturday

Ulla Surland Gallery Eleven
11 Unquowa Rd., Fairfield, (203) 259-1572
Lisie Orjuela: Oil Paintings on Canvas
Jan. 21—Mar. 3, 2012.
Opening Reception: Sat., Jan. 21, 6:30—8:30 p.m.

Press release

Lisie Orjuela was born in Argentina, South America. She has lived in a number of countries including Uruguay, Switzerland, Mexico and several states in the United States. She currently lives in Trumbull, Connecticut. She creates art in her studio space in the American Fabrics Arts building in Bridgeport, Connecticut. She received a BFA from Andrews University in Michigan and an MFA from New York University.

Orjuela's art is multi-faceted, energetic and deep. While she works, she dwells in the world of dreams where imagery, color, magic and ambiguity blend and sway creating a reality that competes with wakefulness in its complexity. The works evolve slowly; layers emerge and perhaps submerge only to emerge again as Orjuela wields her art with oil paint, oil bars and oil pastels. Her paintings are a stream of consciousness inspired and steered by her multi cultural experiences, the demands and responsibilities of her busy life and her hopes, fears and dreams. The elements of her life combine and bubble to the surface of her beautiful paintings.


Orjuela does her job as an artist magnificently well; she dazzles and alters our perceptions with deftness and grace, never succumbing to manipulation or sentimentality. An exciting journey awaits as one surrenders to the powerful and modified reality depicted in Orjuela's paintings and allow the richness of this world to guide the direction of ones thoughts. There are no set rules here, or rather, the rules change at random. A crow is sinister at one glance and friendly and playful in the next. Color carries one from cool and murky depths to fierce and heated heights. The pathways through these paintings are natural and without affect. Things are just as they should be even if what that is may be subject to change and full of mystery. One emerges from this journey feeling rejuvenated and enlightened, having been touched by something natural, open and honest in our world where artifice reigns.