Julie Umerle Paintings

Julie Umerle
Photo by Jens Marott

Julie Umerle is a contemporary artist known for her abstract paintings. Umerle's paintings often explore the interplay of colour, form, and texture. She employs bold and vibrant hues, creating dynamic compositions that engage the viewer. Her works can range from large-scale canvases to smaller, more intimate pieces, each showcasing her mastery of colour and composition.

The artist's abstract style allows for a sense of freedom and experimentation in her work. She may employ various techniques such as layering, drips, brushstrokes, or other gestural marks to build up texture and depth within her paintings. Umerle's compositions are non-representational, inviting viewers to interpret the works in their own subjective ways.

Throughout her practice, Umerle often explores the relationship between chaos and order. Her compositions may balance elements of spontaneity and control, resulting in a harmonious tension within her artworks. This exploration of duality and the dynamic interaction between opposing forces is a recurring theme in her body of work.

Julie Umerle's art has been exhibited in galleries and art institutions internationally, allowing her to reach a diverse audience. Her works have the potential to evoke a range of emotions and engage viewers through their energetic and captivating presence.

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Art, Life and Everything: A Memoir

                                                            

Julie Umerle's 'Art, Life and Everything' is a captivating exploration of the artist's personal journey and the intricate connection between art and life. Umerle, an award-winning  contemporary artist, opens up her world to readers, inviting them to delve into the depths of her creative process, inspirations, and the profound impact of art on her life.

 

One of the standout aspects of this book is Umerle's ability to seamlessly intertwine her personal anecdotes with her artistic endeavors. She weaves together her life experiences, ranging from her childhood memories to her travels and encounters with fellow artists, with profound insights into the artistic process. This fusion of personal narratives and artistic reflections creates a multi-layered narrative that adds depth and authenticity to her work.

 

Umerle's writing style is both eloquent and accessible, making it easy for readers to immerse themselves in her world. Her descriptions of her artistic techniques and the emotions behind her work are vivid and evocative, allowing readers to gain a deeper understanding of the nuances of abstract art. Whether you are an art enthusiast or someone with limited knowledge of the art world, Umerle's engaging prose ensures that you will find something to appreciate and connect with.

 

Furthermore, 'Art, Life and Everything' offers valuable insights into the challenges faced by artists, the creative process, and the ongoing dialogue between an artist and their work. Umerle's candid reflections on her own doubts, struggles, and triumphs serve as a source of inspiration for aspiring artists and a reminder to all readers that the creative journey is often fraught with uncertainty.

 

The book is also visually stunning, featuring a collection of Umerle's artwork throughout its pages. This inclusion allows readers to witness the evolution of her style and the progression of her artistic voice over the years. The juxtaposition of text and art creates a synergistic experience, enhancing the overall impact of Umerle's narrative.

 

In conclusion, 'Art, Life and Everything' by Julie Umerle is a captivating memoir that delves into the intertwined realms of art and life. Umerle's ability to blend personal narratives with profound reflections on her art creates a compelling and immersive reading experience. Whether you are an art lover or simply interested in gaining a deeper understanding of the creative process, this book is a worthy addition to your library.

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Julie Umerle: Abstract Innovator

Julie Umerle is a contemporary artist known for her captivating abstract paintings and innovative use of color and form. Born and raised in a creative household, Julie developed a deep appreciation for art from an early age, and her passion for painting blossomed into a remarkable career.

Julie's artistic journey began with a solid foundation in traditional techniques and formal training. She honed her skills at renowned art institutions, earning a Masters of Fine Arts degree from a prestigious art school. Her studies allowed her to explore various artistic styles and mediums, which laid the groundwork for her later experimentation and unique artistic voice.

Throughout her career, Julie has been fascinated by the interplay of colour, light, and texture. Her artworks are characterized by bold, gestural brushstrokes, creating a dynamic sense of movement and energy on the canvas. Julie's distinctive style often blurs the boundaries between abstraction and representation, inviting viewers to experience her paintings in a deeply personal and introspective manner. Her ability to evoke emotions through her use of colour and composition has garnered critical acclaim and captivated audiences worldwide.

Over the years, Julie has exhibited her work in numerous solo and group exhibitions, gaining recognition for her innovative approach and artistic excellence. Her paintings have found their way into private collections, galleries, and museums around the globe, solidifying her status as a respected and influential artist.

In addition to her artistic practice, Julie is committed to sharing her knowledge and passion with others. She has taught workshops and delivered lectures, inspiring aspiring artists and fostering a greater appreciation for the arts within the community.

Julie Umerle's artistic journey is an ongoing exploration of color, form, and expression. With each stroke of the brush, she invites viewers to step into her world, where imagination and emotion intertwine to create a visual symphony. As she continues to push artistic boundaries and challenge conventions, Julie's work will undoubtedly leave an indelible mark on the contemporary art scene for years to come.

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Art UK Prints

Exciting news! Two of my paintings that are in public art collections are now available to buy as prints from Art UK through their online shop: Art UK

'Eclipse' and 'Drift' can be bought as prints in various sizes, framed or unframed. Prices start at £12.95.

Images are printed to order on acid-free art papers using the latest digital technology.

Shop my prints at Art UK!

Video of Recent Paintings by Julie Umerle at Bermondsey Project Space: Part 1

                        

Here is Part One of three videos that I posted last year on my Youtube channel. They document my solo exhibition 'Recent Paintings' at Bermondsey Project Space, London in 2021.

The narration is by Anna McNay who curated the show.

Julie Umerle's exhibition 'Recent Paintings' was supported by an award from Arts Council England and took place from 18 - 29 May 2021.

Sotheby's Cologne

 

Cobalt, 2021
Julie Umerle

My work is heading to auction at Sothebys later this year! I am very proud to be auctioning my painting 'Cobalt' at a charity auction at Sotheby's in Cologne this autumn. 

I will be participating in an exhibition and charity auction at Sotheby’s Palais Oppenheim in Cologne from September 29 – October 5. It has been curated by Michael Schmidt-Ott and is the fifth such auction he has curated (and the first in Germany). All proceeds support people with dementia and their families.

This project includes 200 artists from 54 different countries, which makes it the most international charity art auction ever.

Sotheby’s will be auctioning the works on October 5, 2023 with an accompanying published catalogue.

Short Review / Norwich University of the Arts

 

Pleased to see this short review of my memoir 'Art, Life and Everything' by the library at Norwich University of the Arts who stock my book in their collection:

"An honest and enjoyable autobiography from Julie Umerle showcasing her determination and dedication to navigating the world of visual art as a disabled artist. An engaging read for any artist or creator." 

I am thrilled that so many university libraries have chosen to acquire my memoir which helps it reach a wide and diverse audience. And a big shout out to the library at Norwich University of the Arts for profiling my book on social media!

Here's a link to 'Art, Life and Everything' should you wish to read it: amzn.en/dp/1527242161

State/F22 review of 'Art, Life and Everything' by Anna McNay

SPIRIT AND SURVIVAL

An Artist's Tale

Every artist knows the struggle to find a suitable studio; the ups and downs of positive crits and gallerists’ or collectors’ interest in their work, interspersed with periods of seeming failure; and, more often than not, the need to find some other source of income to support themselves in their artistic career. Art, Life and Everything, the memoir of abstract artist Julie Umerle, takes its reader on just such a rollercoaster journey, exacerbated, for a time, as she splits her life between London and New York.

Umerle is not only struggling as an artist. Aged four, she suffered a convulsive fit that left her paralysed. Later diagnosed with Transverse Myelitis – a rare neurological disorder involving inflammatory attacks on the central nervous system – she has battled with fluctuating and worsening levels of debilitation ever since and has been a wheelchair-user for most of her life, something which presents a whole range of additional challenges for an artist working with large-scale canvases (150 x 240 cm).

The book begins in the 1980s after Umerle has finished her degree in fine art at Falmouth University and, having moved back home to Walthamstow, seeks to establish herself on the London art scene. It accompanies her through time spent in a drug-filled squat, her first solo exhibition at the Car Breaker Gallery in Frestonia (the artistic counterculture area of Notting Hill), and on to her settling in to one after another of more-or-less suitable live/work spaces in north London. 

Overcoming life threatening operations on her spine, Umerle is honoured in 1988 with a solo exhibition at the Barbican Centre, Ten Years of Painting. Her career seems to be on the up. Nevertheless, she still needs an income alongside her painting, and, after beginning as a freelance artist helping lead workshops with Shape Arts (an organisation which runs art workshops for people with special needs), she moves on to give talks and lead tours at the Royal Academy and the Hayward Gallery. 

In 1996, however, Umerle ups sticks and heads to New York for a two-year MFA course in painting at Parsons School of Design. Her adventures on the other side of the Atlantic include getting to know her father in Connecticut (where she was born to  immigrant parents, before moving to London with her mum and elder sister, following the breakdown of her parents’ marriage shortly after her paralysis), and having one of her paintings described – apparently in a complimentary manner – by art critic Jerry Saltz as ‘fucked-up formica’. Her art develops, influenced by the Abstract Expressionists and Minimalists, as well as by Gerhard Richter. She experiments with materials and textures, fractals and surfaces. 

Umerle realised early on that she would have to make life decisions on a different basis from most people – bearing in mind accessibility requirements as much as, if not more than, quality of tuition or exhibition space, etc. This is a battle that plays out on some level throughout the book, although Umerle is keen to reinforce her own view that: ‘I do not think of disability as being a big part of my identity. I have always thought, rather, that my identity comes more from being an artist.’ And, ultimately, this is proven by her success. 

As well as her exhibition at the Barbican, she has also shown at such prestigious London venues as the Royal Academy and Christie’s – as well as, more recently, at Bermondsey Project Space. Internationally, she has exhibited in the USA, France, Germany, Poland and China. She has been the recipient of four grants from the Arts Council, and her paintings are held in private and public collections including the Deutsche Bank Collection, The Connaught, Swindon Art Gallery and Madison Museum of Fine Art, USA.

This book is personal and practical, funny and tragic, and, most of all, enduringly relevant to anyone struggling to make a go of things in any career today. 

Anna McNay, State/F22 magazine

Issue 30. May-July 2022

FREE. Available at many art venues

Art, Life and Everything: A Memoir

Julie Umerle

186pp PB

TRYPTIC

ISBN-13: 978-1-5272-4216-6

Available at Amazon.co.uk, Waterstones and Foyles and some independent bookshops

Here's a link to the book should you wish to buy my book: amzn.en/dp/1527242161

5 Needle, 5 Wire

'Five Needle, Five Wire'
Photo by Matthew Tugwell

I am pleased to to be invited as a guest artist to show my work with INFEMS Art Collective at their forthcoming exhibition '5 Needle 5, Wire' at Thames-Side Studios Gallery in London this summer. 

Other guest artists for this show are: Sarah Maple, Vicki da Silva, Alannah Currie, Chloe Wing, Annie Attridge, Carmen and Luisa, Jessica Voorsanger, Fiona Robinson, Tina True and Farrah Riley-Gray.

August 5 - 21 August 2022

Co-founders of INFEMS are: Roxana Halls, Marie-Anne Mancio, Rebecca Fontaine-Wolf, Adelaide Damoah and Wendy Elia.

Thames-Side Studios Gallery is located at Unit 4 Harrington Way, Warspite Road, London SE18 5NR

Open 12 - 5pm, Thursday to Sunday 

Friday 5th August 2022 : Panel Discussion - InFems, Invited Artists & Tamsin Hong, curator, TATE - 6pm 

Exhibition Opening/ Private View 7-9pm 

Infems evolved out of their mutual interest in both the potential of intersectional feminism to provoke discussion around the issues facing women today and in their explorations of the female body. They purposefully create spaces for community and connection not only to the guest artists in their exhibitions but also to the audiences in an aim to make art and issues surrounding intersectional feminism accessible to all. 

Since their inaugural exhibition ‘Biting Back and Enjoying the Taste’ at PADA, Lisbon in August 2021, InFems have curated ‘No Reserve’ at Leicester Contemporary, mentored emerging artists, and been commissioned by House of Herrera to create ‘Nightclubbing,’ a unique set of NFTS for International Women’s Day 2022, all proceeds to women’s charity Fundación Ared. They were also invited to exhibit related works at M&C Saatchi’s London HQ (March 2022). 

Continuing their ethos of creating a genuine, supportive network of diverse artists in the UK and abroad to expand the conversation around feminism, InFems have invited 11 guest artists to exhibit alongside them, including: 

Alannah Currie, renowned feminist activist, musician and supporter of ‘female artists making mischief’ with her free residencies from her artist-led gallery space, among whose creative monikers are: one of the Thompson Twins as co-writer, performer and visual director of the internationally successful pop band, the Sisters of Perpetual Resistance, an imagined group of militant feminists, and Miss Pokeno, her current alias. 

Sarah Maple, whose artwork, film and performances have been exhibited internationally at galleries and institutions including Tate Britain and whose recent commissions include The Baltic and Sky Arts. 

Vicki DaSilva, internationally recognised light graffiti and light painting photography pioneer who has been making her works since 1980 and whose associates have included Keith Haring, Joan Jonas and Richard Serra.

5 Needle, 5 Wire 

Thames-Side studios sits on the site of the old Siemens factory in an area with a history of factory workers, engineers, and makers. InFems’ exhibition takes its name from the five needle telegraph system, patented in 1837 at the start of the Victorian era. Designed by Charles Wheatstone, this diamond-shaped open dial was alphabetical, with five needles worked by five different wires that could be manipulated to point to the required letter. If the name for this innovation was prosaic, it is rich in associations. 

5 is a key number in so many systems. Religions - Five Pillars of Islam, five-faced Shiva, the Hindu god, Christ’s Five Sacred Wounds, the Five Books of Moses, five sacred Sikh symbols; the five elements of the Ancient Greeks - earth, water, air, fire, and spirit; the five virtues in Chinese philosophy - generosity, kindness, gravity, sincerity, and earnestness, and so on. Needle recalls the domestic sphere. Stitching, a history of women making samplers or quilts, a pulling together. Sometimes that sewing was subversive. 

The sampler of nineteenth-century needle-worker Lorina Bulwer, imprisoned in the lunatic ward at Great Yarmouth Workhouse, reads “I HAVE WASTED TEN YEARS IN THIS DAMNATION HELL FIRE TRAMP DEN OF OLD WOMEN OLD HAGS”. Needle as verb. Women who needle, who won’t let something go. 

Sharp women… 5 InFems 

Wire: A tangle of wires buried underground, transmitting messages, unseen communications beneath our feet. Like secret languages that travel and evolve: African braids to Egyptian braids to Ancient Greek braids; Polari, the C18th code of vagrants, itinerant performers, sailors, and travellers, adopted and altered. An artist devising her own personal language of symbols; shadow play and scribblings in invisible ink. 

5 Needle, 5 Wire. Where there’s communication, there’s the potential for miscommunication. For women to be silenced. The system could only hold 20 letters. C, J, Q, U and X were left out. What was garbled, or left unsaid?

Art on a Postcard Winter Auction 2021

Small art, big cause

Exciting to see the artworks for Art on a Postcard's Winter Auction 2021!

250 contemporary artists have donated original work for a really good cause, hosted online by The Auction Collective. Artists include Patrick Hughes, Jeremy Deller, Hurvin Anderson, Mick Rooney and Gordon Cheung.

These artworks have been donated to Art on a Postcard's Winter Auction 2021 to raise money for The Hepatitis C Trust which is celebrating its 20th anniversary this year.
⁠⁠
Bidding starts at £50 on each lot⁠⁠
Auction runs 4-25 November

Register to bid -  bit.ly/2YaH6hU

Get bidding now!

FAD magazine review of 'Art, Life and Everything' by Paul Carey-Kent

"In Art, Life and Everything, Julie Umerle chronicles her life as an artist from 1978-2010. She hasn't had an easy ride - for example, she's never been represented by a mainstream gallery - but has kept at it for over forty years now, clocking up enough shows and sales to keep going with the help of part-time jobs, grants and residencies. The book took her a decade to write, in line with the persistence she demonstrates throughout it and was published in 2019."

Paul Carey-Kent. 23 June 2021. FAD Magazine.

Read the full article about 'Art, Life and Everything' by Paul Carey-Kent on FAD magazine here. 

Paul Carey-Kent is  an art critic and curator who writes for Art Monthly, Frieze, Elephant, State, Photomonitor and FAD.

'Art, Life and Everything' is available through Amazon.co.uk, Waterstones and Foyles.⠀

Julie Umerle. ‘Polygon II (Red)’, 2020. Acrylic on linen, 55 x 55cm

    

Here's a link to 'Art, Life and Everything' should you wish to read it: amzn.en/dp/1527242161