James Lavadour is renowned for his expressionist paintings based on familiar and abstract landscapes. In addition to the earthen formations, recurring motifs for Lavadour include flame, fume and mist. Mr. Lavadour’s dominant palette of primary and secondary colors, coupled with his gestural brushstrokes, evoke a sense of energy, whether paced or surging.
At any given time, Lavadour is working on a body of large work; finished pieces tend to be made up of multiple panels, painted individually, and then assembled. The end product, however, is not absolute--the assembly can be broken up for its parts. This “flexibility” of composition is consistent with Lavadour’s belief that everything is part of a continuous flow; what is created is only a marker of a moment. As well, his painting is an evolutionary process and each painting often initiates or inspires the next.
There is a continuous flow of energy and a compounding of events that mark time in a body of work. The whole thing moves forward each time that I discover something new in one painting and apply that lesson to all of the others. In these latest works, color and space, vistas and structures layer upon each other and make me feel as if I am standing before uncountable universes.
— James Lavadour, February 2005
James Lavadour is one of the Northwest’s most revered painters. He is the recipient of numerable awards and accolades, including the Eiteljorg Fellowship (2005), Award for Visual Arts from the Flintridge Foundation (2004), Oregon Governor’s Arts Award (1994), and the Betty Bowen Award (1991), among many others. Lavadour’s work is in the collections of the Portland Art Museum, Seattle Art Museum, Tacoma Art Museum, Boise Art Museum, the MicroSoft Collection and other respected public and private collections. James Lavadour is also one of the founding members of Crow’s Shadow Institute for the Arts in Pendleton, Oregon.
