Breehan James

Bio

Breehan James received her MFA from Yale University and a BFA from Massachusetts College of Art. James was a 2014-15 recipient of the Sharpe Walentas Space Program in Brooklyn, and has participated in many residencies and fellowship programs. Most notably at the National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design in Norway, and the National Gallery of Canada. She was awarded fellowships to participate as an Artist-in-Residence for Arts in the Park at Quetico Provincial Park, The Stowe School in England and at the Vermont Studio Center. James exhibits her paintings internationally and is the recipient of the prestigious Marie Sharpe Walsh Foundation studio award “The Space Program” in New York City.

A Wisconsin native, Breehan James' rarified work is centered on connecting to nature and experiencing wildness. James paints specific locations she has explored at her family’s northern Wisconsin cabin and in the wild Boundary Waters of Minnesota. Her studio practice extends works “made in the field” to her “studio” in an effort to evoke these experiences and portray their substance. Documenting flora and fauna in all its wondrous complexity through countless delicate brushstrokes, her work has a magical beauty that transcends actuality. Elegantly capturing beautiful light, spellbinding vistas, and enchanting figures, her work astounds, delights, and provokes contemplation.

"My work is about place: remote yet specific places that manifest the essence and transformative power of the wilderness. The paintings portray the immersion and focus I find in these isolated forests and authentic cabins, disconnected from the habits and comforts of everyday life. Paintings and drawings—made in the field when I’m canoe camping and deer hunting—document these landscapes and cabin cultures. In my studio, I build on these works in order to evoke these experiences and portray their substance. While challenging and playing with conventions in landscape painting, I am influenced by the aesthetics and tastes of my northern Midwestern upbringing, in addition to late nineteenth-century Nordic landscape painting and the work of American and Canadian artist adventurers."