Layers of genius

Local artist creates a buzz with textured, mixed media art

By Nate Traylor

Leader Staff

POLSON — A.M. Stockhill has retired from her career as a starving artist and is now entering into an exciting new profession as a prosperous one.

Though she graduated from the University of Montana with a bachelor’s in art a little over year ago, her work is already catching on with collectors around Northwest Montana, making her an exception among her art scholar peers, many of whom spend the better part of a decade schlepping sandwiches or serving up lattes before they make it big — if ever.

Because the public have been responding so favorably to her work, she gained the confidence to waive goodbye to her part-time job at the Lake County Courthouse to focus on her passion fulltime.

“I feel very lucky,” said the paint speckled Stockhill in her Polson studio. “They say it is takes an artist an average of 10 years to quit their day job.”

Stockhill’s work is piling up around her like files on the desk of a lazy clerk. But ‘lazy’ isn’t a word you’d use to describe this 20-something who works daily to keep up with demand and to present new work at the many showings she has scheduled.

Stacks on tops of tables, under tables, leaning against walls and the piles in the corners indicate she has her work cut out for her. Asked to estimate the number of paintings waiting for the finishing touches, Stockhill concludes that it’s “Probably a couple hundred.”

Never one to take on one task at a time, she starts a piece, sets it aside and moves onto the next until she’s inspired to start another. Because much of her work requires layer upon layer, she can work on dozens of pieces at a time.

“A lot of times I’ll work on 10 or 20 different backgrounds at once because it takes so long for the paint to dry before I can apply the next layer,” she explained. “I work on so many pieces at a time that I’ll get really into doing one thing that I’ll change my mind. Then I’ll put all those canvases away to dry, and then I’ll come up with this other great idea while these paintings are drying that I’ll get out another 10 canvases.”

Some of her work reflects the rural beauty of Montana, while other pieces are pure abstract.

Her creative process uses layers of glazes topped with oils, acrylics, collage elements and whatever she can stick to a canvas in order to render deep textures. Look closely and you’ll find items commonly found in any household junk drawer — nuts, bolts, screws and other bits and pieces — imbedded into layers, along with broken glass, resin or other materials to create undulating surfaces so prominent in her work.

“My paintings could have anywhere between a dozen layers of paint to 30 or 40,” she said.

As a result, it can take anywhere from eight to 16 hours to complete a background.

But sometimes her backgrounds come from the work of turn-of-the-century western romance novelists, such as the case with her mixed media horse series. Using the pages of 100 year old western novels as her canvas not only complements her equine themed paintings, but she’s also preserving classic literature under layers of protective varnish.

“I find these old books that are kind of falling apart, losing their spines and have pages missing and they’re not worth anything to anyone, so I kind of feel like I’m taking a bit of history and I’m saving it,” she said.

Not only do the yellowed, dingy pages of aged books look better aesthetically than new pages, but the paper quality is better and they have less acidity in the pulp, Stockhill explained.

Her favorite book to use is The Virginian. Published in 1902, it is the quintessential western novel that tells the story of tall heroic cowboy who wins the heart of a pretty schoolmarm after saving the county from horse thieves.

“People look at the background and they say “Hey, The Virginian!’” said Stockhill. “It’s something that is kind of personal with people, something they can identify with. So I use it more often than anything else.”

She figures she has a dozen copies of the book waiting to serve as the backdrop to a scene of steeds.

She also uses the pages of ancient law books which gives her an opportunity to see how far we’ve come as a society while creating her unique backgrounds.

“It is absolutely incredible to read some of that when I’m pasting them down. I’m like ‘Oh my gosh, these were the laws back then!’”

She garners a lot of positive feedback when displaying her work at galleries, which is reassuring for the former psychology student. She was three years into her pursuit of a psychology degree when she decided to major in art.

“I just figured art was something I had a talent for, so I really just put my mind it,” she said.

It was a decision that she won’t likely regret.

“I’m just shocked by how well everything has taken off,” she said.

Stockhill has her own website at www.amstockhill.com.