Nancy Rubens makes mixed media abstractions on canvas and paper using acrylic paint, glued papers and found materials. Rubens cuts curving strands of paper freehand then pastes them down on the canvas, building compositions of paint, paper, gauze and other elements that exhibit a heightened pleasure in color and texture.  There is a sensation of motion in the work; of some unseen force that gives vitality to the compositions and coherence to the individual elements.

In 2004, Rubens worked with monotype for the first time in a workshop with Michael Mazur at Provincetown’s Fine Arts Work Center. The prints made there became the catalyst for her current series, and led to a radical departure from her previous, more rectilinear abstractions. Rubens began to cut and stencil sinuous grass-like shapes and integrate them into the prints, and moved toward a softer, more organic and curvilinear composition.  In her preferred medium of collage painting, these forms, originally inspired by nature, have moved into pure abstraction. Each collaged or painted strand follows its own individual path—reaching and meandering across the surface of the canvas, bringing to mind Paul Klee’s writings about “taking a line for a walk.”  

Some of the pieces feel quiet and open, while others are dense and complex.  Paradoxically, even those that are complicated convey an overall mood of calm.  In the seeming randomness, there is a sense of structure and order, and also of playful discovery.  At times, printed and sometimes recognizable used papers find their way into the work, inviting other associations.  These papers that have served their purpose and would have been discarded find fresh meaning in a new context, and they evoke a sense of the passage of time, of human intervention and experience.

Rubens lives and works in New York City and Wellfleet.  She received a BA at Connecticut College and later studied at the Art Students League of New York, where she eventually focused on collage while studying with Leo Manso.   Most recent exhibits have been in New York at Lori Bookstein Fine Art and Cheryl Pelavin Fine Art, at Yale University, and at the Cahoon Museum of American Art.