Icelandic Inspiration Patricia Aaron shares work created during a residence near Reykjavik

Patricia Aaron relishes the opportunity to participate in artist residencies in the U.S. and abroad. During the late spring of 2016, she traveled to Iceland to spend a month absorbing Icelandic culture and communicating her experiences through encaustic paintings.

“I lived and painted in a renovated 1926 dairy barn about 20 minutes outside Reykjavik (the country’s capital and largest city),” says Aaron. “Instead of bringing encaustics with me, I decided to paint in oil on paper and make encaustic paintings based on my works on paper back in my Colorado studio.”

“Giving Way to Still,” Aaron’s new show of works reflecting her time in Iceland, opens on July 7 at The Globe Gallery.

Among the paintings on exhibit are six called “Library of Water,” which is the name of a library in a small village on the west side of the country.

“This library has water from 24 glaciers in Iceland,” Aaron explains. “There are tubes that extend from the floor to the ceiling filled with glacial water. In Iceland, it’s all about water and weather.”

Aaron’s paintings were inspired by her contacts with the Icelandic people and their culture. While she established a camaraderie with other artists in residence, she preferred to enjoy daily adventures by herself. “People tended to talk with me more when I was traveling alone,” she says. “They were so friendly. I got a chance to meet a lot of people.”

Aaron, an adjunct professor at the University of Denver where she studied sculpture and painting and earned a Master of Fine Arts degree, has enjoyed artist residencies in France, Hawaii, Virginia, New Mexico, Colorado and Wyoming. Her work has been featured in solo museum and airport exhibitions and is part of a number of private, corporate and museum collections.