Kaitlin Merchant

Kaitlin Merchant is a mostly self-taught artist based in Dallas, Texas. Her work explores the complexity of color, movement, dimensionality, contrast and depth of texture. The tension and duality between contrasting materials and mediums are amplified by Merchant’s insatiable thirst for knowledge.  She layers her personal experiences, thoughts, feelings, and observations using a visual language in a way that words don’t fully encapsulate.

Merchant’s paintings begin with a digital sketch and then a bright base layer. Using layers of gesso, acrylic, oil, fine art tape and washi tape, she creates lines, shapes, and patterns. Layers, texture, and the duality of the materials are the primary focus of this work. She works with brushes that can withstand the physicality of her gestural approach to mark making. Her mixed media series continues this exploration with the added layer of discarded detritus providing a rich texture of things that have served their purpose- coffee grounds, tea and citrus fruit bags, flowers, leaves, and scraps of paint are adhered to the surface, and mix with the thick layers of paint. 

The process of painting is reflective for Merchant – a way to translate thoughts and ideas into a visual reminder. These thoughts and ideas become a mantra that she repeats as she builds layers onto the surface of the piece. Her work highlights and brings these concepts from the layers folded in the back of the viewer’s mind to the front and center, saying “Don’t forget me.” Merchant’s work is an opportunity for viewers to connect with their bright and powerful self hiding below the surface by connecting them with their past and reminding them that nothing is permanent. We usually end up finding what we’re looking for.

When she’s not in the studio painting, she’s playing with her “little guy,” sipping on a latte while listening to a podcast, or escaping on a relaxing adventure to somewhere with wide open horizons.