Jerald Silva
Jerald hadn’t planned on a lot of things. He hadn’t considered there would someday be an internet or that there would be web sites where persons could display, or even want to display, what might be their recorded glory. He didn’t store away the various writings that his work elicited from very kind and thoughtful people. He hadn’t adequately considered the future of his career, and in many ways he still does not consider it all that much. He just does his work quietly and privately in his studio. He doesn’t think much about his job beyond that. His paintings tend to reflect that. Cobbling together information for this site would have been impossible had it not been for his late wife, Susan, who squirreled away scraps of newspapers and magazines and other print material from which he could glean a few relevant bits.
Many of the writings she never saw, so they were not saved and they are gone from his awareness. Only a fraction of the paintings he has made have ever survived, as he was not always attentive to photographically archiving them. He expects that fewer than half of his approximately nine hundred paintings, were ever photographed. These areas of focus are not related to any chronology as they are all done at times overlapping each other and lapping back. In some instances he works on all of these genre concurrently. All the paintings he has shown are done in transparent watercolor. he slightly sizes the paper he is working on with a particular glue in order to prevent the pigments from invading the paper and staining it.
That allows him to scrub out passages he might reconsider. Consequently, he refers to his medium as “watercolor incorrect.” They are “paintings in watercolor.” They are not “watercolors.” The subject matter and themes of his paintings do not require explanation. The paintings do seem to evoke conversation. He likes that.
