About the artist...

“The sea, once it casts its spell, holds one in its net of wonder forever”, wrote Jacques Cousteau. Indeed, all who have stood at the ocean’s edge have felt transfixed by the irrepressible surge and ever-changing dance of water and earth. Born in California, Julie Brookman has spent her life by the sea, even working as a dive instructor in Southeast Asia. She is best known for her encaustic paintings, where through hot wax and pigment she has found a way to capture the myriad faces and moods of the sea in a way that makes time stand still and highlights a unique confluence of elemental chaos. To create her paintings, Brookman focusing on layering, transparency, and repetition in movement to allow the painting to form intuitively and of their own volition.

Brookman's process-driven approach has led to her current work Saudade, which encompasses movement, time, and place. Saudade. A longing for something so indefinite as to be indefinable. A pleasure you suffer, an ailment you enjoy. There are many interpretations for the Portuguese word, yet, none seem to capture the nuance and depth that is present in the native tongue. My latest series, Saudade, is an exploration of the indefinite and uncapturable. I've long been drawn to the sea. It is permanent, but always changing. Never the same, but always there. The act of seeing the sea is the act of remembering it for what it was.

Brookman works as a full-time artist in Montara, California.