Jannette Borland pauses in her studio space with Blue Sky Within.
Jannette Borland: Keeping the skies blue
LaVerne Kyriss
Jannette Borland is not someone who can be confined in a box. She doesn’t have one style, one medium, or single interest. “Inspiration, like life itself, sparks a vision,” she said. “When I settle on a subject, I work on it a while and then find a way to make it my own. I know I’m there when the piece has a stamp that says ‘Me,’ ” she winked.
Borland works often in acrylics in a tiny studio space tucked into a bright corner in her SaddleBrooke laundry room. “The light is great and I don’t have to worry about the floor,” she said. Other times, she takes her work out to her covered patio where she can hear the birds and feel the breeze. “I used to have a much bigger studio space when we lived in Spokane or before that when I started studying art on the East Coast. But we’ve downsized and this works quite well.”
“I believe in letting art happen,” Borland explained. “I’m not afraid to try new things and explore different aspects. I see things with a unique perspective. Sometimes I do abstracts or realism or stylized landscapes or even surrealism. I never know what it’s going to be.” Borland also writes poetry and works in clay. “I’m doing constructive pieces now—mostly for gifts. Maybe I’ll get back into sculpture,” she reflected.
“I’ve always been drawn to the desert scenery and the beautiful textures of the cacti,” she said. But Borland doesn’t portray a cactus in a traditional approach. Instead, the bright orange saguaro on a teal background has an inner blue sky, courtesy of a zipper right down the middle. This surrealistic bent is also found peeking out from what, at first glance, appears to be a large work done in the style of the Renaissance masters. The piece features a solitary monk walking down a cloistered hall toward a chamber illuminated by a bright arched window. The work is very detailed and you can almost feel the stone work. “We were on a trip to Tuscany and I took a photo of a beautiful scene with the light streaming in the window. I knew I had to paint it.”
It’s nothing like the whimsical cactus with a zipper in style, color or tone—but then when you get closer to examine the detail, you suddenly see that the whole building is floating on clouds. “Strange things come out as I’m working on a piece,” Borland said. “I obsess. I bond with every piece. I spent more than 100 hours creating the Dominic’s Devotion painting. I traveled every inch of that canvas and it came to me that the monk (actually my husband in shorts and a tee shirt in the photo) was on a journey to higher knowledge and that’s how I envisioned it.”
“Once I get started on a piece, I work on it every day. I saturate myself in it to explore what it’s going to become and to draw out the story behind the picture. I just remember to keep those blue skies shining,” she smiled.