About the Artist
Artist Bio
Linda Saracino reconnected with her visual side nearly 10 years ago, emerging as a painter and mixed-media collage artist. A career writer-editor, she’s been drawn to art since her New York City childhood, encouraged by her parents who took her to the Met, The Cloisters and downtown galleries. Yet early on, a different path called, leading to a BA, MA and PhD studies in literature/writing, linguistics and theater, and jobs in academe, the corporate world, and publishing in New York, Louisville, Nashville and Orlando.
While words were her primary medium, she never lost touch with her artist spirit. Life shifted after a lengthy conversation with an artist friend whose history paralleled hers. (“He was telling me my life!”). That revelatory encounter jolted her: Start making art.
Two days later she enrolled at Maitland Art Center (now A&H), her first course in a focused curriculum she created soon after. Over the next several years she vigorously pursued an art education, enrolling in courses at Crealdé School of Art and A&H taught by esteemed artists such as Berto Ortega, Donne Bitner and Elizabeth St. Hilaire, plus mixed-media workshops with Lynn Whipple.
Her work ranges from still life in oils to mixed-media collage to simple ink drawings she calls “not-quite-blind contours.” She also works in acrylics and watercolor. Influences include Matisse, Schwitters, Diebenkorn, O’Keefe and Warhol. Her work often plays on literary themes, verbal cues, and words as graphic elements.
One of her popular themes is dresses. She’s best known for her mixed-media dress paintings and collages, which often incorporate vintage ephemera such as book pages, photographs and sheet music. Having been one of 13 artists invited into the prestigious “Dresses: Objects of Art” biennial (Orlando, 2013) was not only an unexpected honor but she says “opened the door” to her then-budding art career, placing her work in front of numerous influential viewers for the first time. She continues to explore new ways to express the dress—edgier, more abstract, sometimes figurative.
She has exhibited in numerous juried group shows at Orlando Museum of Art (1st Thursdays), A&H, CityArts and other area galleries, public institutions and commercial spaces.
Her first solo shows took place in 2014, followed by solo exhibits at area venues such as Timucua Arts Foundation (where she has also painted on stage during live jazz performances), FAVO (the Faith Arts Village Orlando “art motel”), and cafés and businesses. “Confetti,” her two-woman show with Patricia Byron, was held at the popular art-centric Orlando restaurant, Maxine’s on Shine.
Linda’s connection with the community includes having been asked to create a painting for Ronald McDonald House Charities, Orlando, and was commissioned soon after to create a companion piece. In addition, she was selected as one of four featured artists for the New Hope for Kids benefit gala for three years, and has contributed art and time to other children’s agencies, including judging two young-artists shows.
Her work has generated invitations to participate in city and community art initiatives, most notably group exhibits over several years commemorating the Pulse Nightclub tragedy of 2016. She initiated her “Pocketful of Pride” series for those exhibits.
She was twice showcased in Seminole Magazine, and has been featured on WKMG News. In addition to area shows, her work has been in group exhibits in New York City, Los Angeles, Great Britain and Norway, and is in private collections in metro New York City, Southampton (NY), metro Washington DC, Dallas, Chicago, and Napa Valley.
Linda has lived in Orlando for two decades but she’s still a New Yorker at heart: she misses MOMA, Broadway, springtime, and dress displays in Fifth Avenue windows.
About Linda
Like most little kids, I loved making art. New box of crayons? Heaven. Finger paints? Fun! Pencils, “water paints,” paint-by-number kits—my parents kept me supplied. So did my high school’s terrific art studio. I took two years of classes in that studio and hung out there every chance I got.
I continued making art “recreationally” in college and some years after, mostly ink-and-watercolor. That artwork’s long gone, but the delight in making it stuck with me. Years later I discovered decoupage, which eventually opened the door to collage.
But what opened the door to my life as an artist was a long, unexpected conversation more than a decade ago with an artist friend whose background and career were very much like mine. Hearing about his art, aspirations and joy as a then part-time painter did more than resonate: it hit me like a thunderbolt. The next week I enrolled in my first art course.
* * *
In my career as a writer/editor, my primary medium has been words, not paint. That’s why you’ll sometimes see words in my art. I work in oils, acrylics, mixed media, collage, and ink-and-watercolor, often following everyday themes. I paint subjects that catch my eye and stir something. A dress in a department store window can do that. So can three little red garden chairs in a row, or a beautifully lit craft cocktail, or a cut-up orange.
My painting process: sketch, compose and design; then prep the surface, mix the colors, block in the big shapes, edit as needed, and keep painting until it’s done. My collage process follows that line, too, but with some different challenges. I start with a more detailed sketch, gather and prep the papers I need, then arrange them like paints on a palette. They are the “paints,” and I apply them like brushstrokes.
The papers I use include vintage ephemera—miscellaneous printed papers “of no lasting significance . . . meant to be discarded”—and modern papers of all kinds. My vintage stash includes dictionaries, sheet music, photos, cards, menus, ads, handwriting and more. Modern papers range from tissue, rice paper and dress patterns to maps, coffee filters and envelope liners, all of which I paint, stamp, stencil and/or write on first. Then there’s the “bits”—little add-ons like postage stamps, tags, labels, tickets, even bakery string—that add visual or contextual interest, and sometimes a touch of humor. Putting it together can be frustrating (so many paper bits!), but it’s also fun. I’m always happy with the finished piece.
Sometimes I push beyond one painting to create a series (e.g., “Pocketful of Pride,” “Coffee”). To me, a series is the extended expression of something I want to communicate; the message may be an observation, a memory, a statement or a sensibility. I like the challenge of finding fresh ways to shape and express the message within that context.
What’s ahead? Making and showing more art. Pushing themes and series. Working bigger.
Thank you for being here! Come see what’s inside.
~Linda
