Michael Kinsley

Michael Kinsley

For fifty years, Michael has been fortunate to live in the mountains of Colorado, each year more profoundly enthralled by the magic of the natural world. Many of Michael’s paintings pursue that magic, reflecting time-honored schools of landscape painting. Other canvases spin into abstraction, many interpreting natural phenomena, especially rock textures and patterns.

Occasionally, Michael has experimented with paintings that accentuated, even exaggerated the sinuous shapes in nature; some obvious, others obscure. Since early 2019, and more so during the covid isolation, he has explored this idea more deeply, which is reflected in his Fluid Landscapes paintings. Early twentieth-century Canadian painters, Emily Carr and Franklin Carmichael inspired Michael to expand his work in this area — now his primary focus.

Despite the apparent serenity and immutability of Michael’s landscapes, the viewer may detect the feeling, as the artist clearly does, that these beloved scenes are fragile and in jeopardy. Michael has been an advocate for these places for his entire adult life.

Michael’s primary subjects are Western Colorado and Southeast Utah. He paints his smaller pieces on site. Larger landscapes are based on his outside sketches, his abstracts on interesting textures and potent shapes in Nature. He works primarily in oil, occasionally in acrylic, especially for abstracts. Supports include stretched canvas, board, canvas on board, burlap, and wallboard mud with sand.

Michael has lived in the Roaring Fork valley of Colorado since 1970. He is a conflict-resolution practitioner and facilitator, was a county commissioner from ’75 to ’85, and worked for Rocky Mountain Institute from ’83 to 2016.

Galleries

  • 2021/23       Wind River Gallery, Aspen CO
  • 2020/22       Jones Gallery, Kansas City MO
  • 2021/22       The Art Base, Basalt
  • 2020/21       R Gallery, Boulder
  • 2020             Dragonfly Blue Gallery, Taos NM
  • 2010-20       Toklat Gallery, Basalt (and earlier in Ashcroft)
  • 2014/15       809 Gallery, Glenwood Springs
  • 2001            Redstone Art Center
  • 2009            Aspen Artists Cooperative, Aspen Highlands
  • 1999            Woody Creek Art Studio, Woody Creek
  • 1995            Upper Edge Gallery, Aspen
  • 1968            A Houston gallery which name he can’t recall

Community Venues

Many exhibitions, Including juried shows, for thirty years:

  • Aspen Art Museum
  • Red Brick Center for the Arts
  • Aspen Chapel Gallery
  • Snowmass Chapel, Snowmass Village CO
  • First Bank, Carbondale CO
  • Basalt Library
  • Snowmass Club Villas, Snowmass Village CO
  • Carbondale Arts, Carbondale (including a solo show in ‘05)
  • Aspen Valley Land Trust art showings
  • Wilderness Workshop, artist in residence
  • Redstone Art Foundation Labor Day Art Festivals
  • World Cup window exhibit, Aspen CO
  • Aspen Center for Environmental Studies exhibit, Aspen CO
  • Glenwood Springs Art Festival
  • Mining Museum, Leadville CO
  • Community Bank, Basalt CO
  • Alpine Bank, Snowmass Village CO
  • Vectra Bank, Aspen CO

Corporate/Commercial Collections

  • Parc Aspen Restaurant, Aspen CO
  • Rocky Mountain Institute, Basalt CO
  • Valley View Hospital, Glenwood Springs CO