60 Artists Magazine June 2020
After receiving her graduate degree,
Gilkerson landed a full-time teaching
position at Columbia College and found
gallery representation right away in
Columbia and nearby Charleston.
Sales, shows and awards soon followed.
It was during these years that the artist
developed the sense of place expressed
in her paintings. Observing the
landscapes seen on her drives to and
from work gave her plenty of source
material. Also, as an avid equestrian,
she kept a horse for many years on
a nearby farm, which supplied moreMATERIALS
SURFACES
·Forsmallpaintings:
AmpersandGessobord
andRaymarlinenpanels,
whichprovideresistancefor
paintingwitha knife
· Formedium-size
paintings:Ampersand
woodpanelsprimedwith
shellacandthengessoed
· Forlargepaintings:
gallery-wrappedstretched
canvas,sizedwithPVAand
preppedwithacrylicgesso
APPLICATORS
·RGMpaintingknives
·Utrechtbrushes
·rollersandhouse-painting
brushesonextenderpoles
forverylargepaintings
OILPALETTE
· Splitprimaries:
WilliamsburgFanchon
redandCarl’scrimson,
ultramarineblueand
phthaloblue,yellowochre
andIndianyellow
· Whites:Gamblinflake
whitereplacement,radiant
whiteandwarmwhite
· Conveniencecolors:
WilliamsburgItalianterra
verte,Egyptianviolet
andMontserratorange;
occasionally,Michael
Harding,Vasari,BlueRidge
orSenneliercolorsdirect opportunities to explore the local scenery. “I started
looking closely at the area around Columbia and discovered
it’s really quite beautiful. I became deeply connected to my
surroundings because I painted them over and over again.”
But teaching and trying to keep an art career going was
tough. When her duties as a professor threatened to crowd
out her painting time, she made a commitment to paint
every day. “I worked on top of my washing machine—in
the evening, under bad light—just because I was so frus-
trated with not having time to paint,” she says. Eventually,
Gilkerson found she needed to move her studio into a sepa-
rate space. “I’d had my studio in my house for two years and
wasn’t getting any sleep,” she says. “I’d go to paint after din-
ner, and I’d suddenly realize it was 2 a.m., and I had an 8 a.m.
class.” So, she rented a 600-square-foot space in a retail area
above a storefront. Finally, in 2016, after 26 years in a faculty
position, she left the university to became a full-time artist.
Although Gilkerson still maintains a studio and home in
South Carolina, she recently moved to Savannah, Ga., and
has become enamored with the Savannah National Wildlife
Refuge, a conservation area comprised of historic rice plan-
tations. “When I paint there, just outside my car, I’m literally
standing on the old rice dikes. There’s not enough space to
set up anywhere else.” (See Summer, Rice Fields; above.)ABOVE
Summer, Rice Fields
oil on panel, 5x7OPPOSITE
Red Cedar, Dunes
oil on panel, 6x6