Hale County
Painting, Jewelry, Found Art
“The relation between what beauty is and fashion has always intrigued me. Fashion has replaced the classic idea of beauty with its own changing ideals. My work explores how the current fashion ideal exaggerates the figure by substituting its visual ideal for personal perfection.
The female form has a recurring theme in my work. This new work explores fashion’s current exaggeration of lips and eyes as representing the ideal beauty. My paintings are acrylic, ink and graphite on birch board and are done in a colorful, pop style.
The paintings deal with obvious imperfections that fashion now dictates to be today’s visual ideal. As in previous work, these paintings depict women trying to mold their faces to fit fashion. For centuries, women have been judged by their looks. Now, women are judging themselves using fashion’s ideal as the standard to which they must conform.”
Koontz, a fine arts professional with a BPFA in Painting and Drawing from the University of Tennessee in Chattanooga, attributes her mom and dad for inspiring her to create. She has been making art since she was 3 years old, and says she ‘gets lost’ in her art. She loves to share her love of art with others through teaching – and says that she “lives, breathes, and eats the Arts!”