Karsten Coty-Scholl is just 21, but his portrait paintings, mostly in oils, were so impressive that he’s been given a solo show at the Osoyoos Art Gallery. Coty-Scholl works in a studio in his family’s basement and he was burning the midnight oil to finish paintings in time for the show, Where I’m Going – Portraits, which opened last Friday. (Richard McGuire photo)
Last week, before the opening of his solo show at the Osoyoos Art Gallery, young painter Karsten Coty-Scholl was working through the night to finish his paintings.
Coty-Scholl, 21, is believed to be the youngest artist to have a solo exhibition at the gallery. Looking at the quantity and quality of his paintings, however, it’s hard to believe he’s only been out of high school a few years.
“Where I’m Going – Portraits by Karsten Coty-Scholl” runs until May 23 at the gallery.
Coty-Scholl said his show at the Osoyoos Art Gallery came about after he did a showing about a year ago at JoJo’s Café in downtown Osoyoos.
Art gallery curator Sue Whittaker saw Coty-Scholl’s work at JoJo’s, admired it and thought his work might help to attract younger visitors to the gallery.
A movie buff – his favourite film was Gladiator – Coty-Scholl’s portraits often feature faces of actors from the films he loves.
As more and more painters take up acrylics, Coty-Scholl prefers to work with oil.
“About 85 per cent of my work is with my favourite medium, which is oil,” he said. “I prefer oil because it gives me more time to work with my subjects and achieve a little bit more blending that way. As well as a richness in colour, I just find that the oils glow as opposed to the acrylics, which are kind of glossy.”
Acrylic, he said, dries faster, which is one reason some artists prefer it.
Coty-Scholl works in an improvised studio in the basement of his family’s home, which is set amidst the vineyards and orchards overlooking Osoyoos Lake to the north of town.
He’d been working through the night when the Osoyoos Times showed up to take a photo.
It’s not the first time he has worked through the night. He recalls an incident when he was still in Osoyoos Secondary School (OSS), enjoying art, but not yet committed to becoming an artist.
It wasn’t so much the OSS curriculum that got him started, but rather a girl at the school who he liked.
“She was into art and I wanted to impress her,” he recalls. “ She said ‘Oh, I would love to see your work.’ So I went home that day and I drew the whole night from when I got home. From then on, it was always part of what I was doing.”
Although the girl was impressed, she never became his girlfriend. She did, however, motivate him to pursue his art seriously.
“It worked out beautifully,” he said.
Coty-Scholl says he’s been seriously committed to art for about three years, trying to educate himself about it and focus on his goal.
After graduating from high school, he began working on a portfolio with the idea of going to a school for fine arts in the Lower Mainland.
“I started painting and I found that I loved painting so much that I said, ‘Scrap the whole portfolio idea. I’m just going to continue doing this.’”
He doesn’t rule out the idea of pursuing a formal education in art in the future, but for now he would rather take workshops with artists he admires and pursue his painting.
Coty-Scholl says three artists – all with different styles – have had the most influence on him: Sebastian Krüger, Rich Pellegrino and Andrew Salgado.
Krüger is known for a style he calls “new pop realism,” which is hyper realistic. Pellegrino’s work is also pop art, but more stylistic and with enhanced colours. Salgado does expressionist large oil portraits that are a bit more abstract.
“I kind of define myself as between all of them, which is perfect,” said Coty-Scholl. “I would call myself highly stylistic, surrealist colour, but trying to attribute it to a more realist kind of edge to it.”
The Osoyoos Art Gallery is at 8713 Main Street. It is open Tuesday to Saturday from noon to 4 p.m.
RICHARD McGUIRE
Osoyoos Times
