Exploring Expressive Realism in Painting: A Dance Between Perception and Emotion

Shaw’s Cove - oil on linen panel - 9 x 12 inches - plein air painting by Kimberly Scott

People like to put art into boxes. Impressionism, realism, abstract, contemporary, representational. Labels help us make sense of things. I understand why we do it, but as someone who paints, labels can also feel a little too neat. Painting rarely feels neat while you're doing it.

The term expressive realism is one I keep coming back to because it gets close to what I'm after, even if it doesn't completely pin it down. It feels like a place somewhere between what we see and what we feel. A place where reality and perception start leaning into each other.

For me, expressive realism isn't really about copying the world exactly as it sits in front of me. Cameras can already do that. It's more about starting with reality and then allowing room for interpretation—for color, emotion, memory, and whatever else sneaks into the process.

I might begin with a landscape, a person, or an ordinary scene, but somewhere along the way it becomes less about documenting the thing and more about my experience of the thing. Sometimes I exaggerate color because it feels right. Sometimes I simplify shapes. Sometimes I leave things out entirely. The goal isn't accuracy for the sake of accuracy. It's trying to get at something that feels true.

I've always been drawn to artists who seem to do that. Artists like Alice Neel, Lucian Freud, Andrew Wyeth, and Antonio López García all worked very differently, but they brought something of themselves into what they painted. Their work doesn't just show you what something looked like. It feels observed. Felt. Lived in.

Color plays a big role for me too. I used to think certain colors carried fixed meaning. That bright colors meant joy and muted colors meant sadness.I'm not so sure anymore. Quiet moments can be vibrant. Solitude can be full of color. Sometimes a calm painting isn't calm because of muted grays and blues. Sometimes it's orange and gold and deep turquoise.

I think that's what interests me so much: the space where things stop behaving according to rules.

Lately I've been realizing that I don't want paintings to just be pictures of things. I want them to feel like experiences, small pauses where someone stops for a moment and notices something they might otherwise walk right past. Maybe they feel something they can't quite explain.

I also find myself drifting toward that place between realism and abstraction. Not so far that objects disappear completely, but far enough that the painting has room to breathe. Room for weirdness. Room for interpretation. Room for mystery.

Maybe expressive realism is just my way of giving myself permission to do that.

To start with what I see and leave room for what I feel.