Artwork copyright Jacqueline Barnett. Photo courtesy of the artist.

Connections, 1989

Jacqueline Barnett
American (born 1934)

Location: Washington State Arts Commission, Olympia

About the Artwork

Connections is an abstract painting by artist Jacqueline Barnett. The composition emphasizes the division of two halves, connected by white lines and circular forms. The artist notes that you can interpret the two halves as the conscious self and the organic earth. She states that this piece “was about the drive to find meaning, to connect, to be a part of a larger structure than just ourselves. The painting became a painting about the energy one gets from the earth.”

This artwork was acquired for the State Art Collection in partnership with Washington State Arts Commission.

About the Artist

Jacqueline Barnett is a Seattle-based artist. Her abstract artworks explore visual narratives and emotions found in the interaction of color, gesture, and form.
Born in New York, Barnett took an interest in art from a young age. In 1955, she graduated from Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York. In 1966, her husband accepted a faculty position at Stanford Law School and they moved to California with their five children. She first took formal painting classes at Stanford, where she became interested in feminism and in communicating a sense of self in her paintings and monotype prints. She and her husband have lived in Seattle since 1985, where she continues to create expressive and energetic abstract paintings.