When considering my path as an artist, I liken it to being on a long hike. I start strong and energized, eventually slowing down to observe my surroundings. I take a break for nourishment; perhaps even leave the trail for a while. When I set out again, I’m filled with renewed focus, excitement and perspective.
I've been a corporate graphic designer, art director, creative director, mother (requiring the most creativity), and now work full time as a visual media fine artist. I make art by merging photography with digital and traditional printmaking techniques. I'm drawn to landscapes, with or without human influence or structures, and to the natural world of flora and fauna. The wild beauty of the Adirondack Mountains is an ongoing source of inspiration. A fleeting glimpse of a decaying barn or a ray of light in the woods stops me in my tracks. I'm also fascinated by the constant activity of creatures in my garden, the way a bee works a flower head or how a robin tends its nest. In my images, I create imaginary worlds based on what I've seen. At times, I photograph dead birds and insects that I encounter outdoors and reanimate them in my work, bearing witness to their essential existence. Rich, brightly saturated colors belie themes of turmoil, abandonment, and possible danger in the everyday world. The effects of human activity and climate change, loss of native habitat and its effect on wildlife are ever-present in my mind. While these themes influence my narratives, I leave the viewer to interpret how the visual stories I create might play out. My eyes see a world of coexistence through at least one rose-colored lens. I hope to draw the viewer in, to give her a sense of having been in a place or to help him ponder what it might be like to see the world from a bird's eye view.
I work by combining photographic images with each other and with traditional printmaking or other abstract mark-making work. I use an iPhone, a digital SLR and a flat-bed scanner to capture the world around me. These images are catalogued, along with other found resources, into extensive digital files. I look through them often to become intimately familiar and to create a working image library in my mind.
Ideas for work are born either as an organic response to a monotype or photograph, or in concert with an ongoing narrative. I make digital composites by layering, manipulating and editing, adding color, transparency and texture to create reimagined worlds. Final images are printed with pigment inks on fine art photographic paper and additionally handworked with pigment transfers, pencils, inks, dyes, markers or paint: the result is a single unique print or a small limited edition of archival works on paper.
Hand-pulled monotype base for “Twilight of the Natural World”
Photo editing
Solo, Two Person & Small Group Exhibitions
• 2019 Imagined Reflections, solo exhibition, Lake Placid Center for the Arts in conjunction with Lake Placid-North Elba Historical Society, Lake Placid, NY • 2023 Double Vision, Janet Millstein & Anastasia Osolin, Bluseed Studios, Saranac Lake, NY • 2024 Creepy Creatures, invitational group exhibition, Bluseed Studios, Saranac Lake, NY • 2024 Lake Placid Center for the Arts/ Gallery46 and Coldwell Banker Whitbeck, select group show, 5 Broadway Gallery Space, Saranac Lake, NY
Selected Invitational & Members Exhibitions
• 2022 Affordable Art Fair NYC—Spring, represented by Gallery46, Lake Placid, NY • 2020 Lake Placid Center for the Arts, Little Big Show, Lake Placid, NY • 2021 Lake Placid Center for the Arts, 46 Peaks / 46 Perspectives, Lake Placid, NY • 2013 Art Center of Northern New Jersey, Printmaking Affiliates exhibition, New Milford, NJ • 2012 Pine Gallery, Explorations in Print, Printmaking Affiliates of New Jersey, Fairlawn, NJ • 2010 Corscaden Barn, Females on the Fringe, invitational group exhibition, Summer Arts 2010, Keene Valley, NY • 2009 Corscaden Barn, Adk Eclectic, invitational group exhibition, Summer Arts 2009, Keene Valley, NY • 2009 Show Walls Gallery, New Graphic Arts group exhibition, New York, NY • 2007 Printmaking Affiliates of Northern New Jersey, members exhibition, BergenPac, Englewood, NJ
Selected Juried Exhibitions
• 2023 Adirondack Artists Guild, 25th Annual Juried Exhibition, Saranac Lake, NY • 2023 Lake Placid Center for the Arts, Save our Winter, themed juried exhibition, Lake Placid, NY (First Place Jurors Award)
• 2022 Lake Placid Center for the Arts, annual juried exhibition, Lake Placid, NY (First Place Jurors Award)
• 2021 Barrett Art Center, Fun House: Art of the Surreal, Fantastic, +Bizarre, national juried exhibition, Poughkeepsie, NY
• 2020 ASmith Gallery, Portraits, international juried exhibition, Johnson City, Texas
• 2018 Lake Placid Center for the Arts, annual juried exhibition, Lake Placid, NY
• 2011 Center for Contemporary Printmaking, Editions, annual juried exhibition, Norwalk, CT
• 2010 Center for Contemporary Printmaking, Footprint, international juried exhibition, Norwalk, CT
• 2009 A Point of View Gallery, national juried exhibition, Lake Placid, NY
• 2009 Lake Placid Center for the Arts, open annual juried exhibition, Lake Placid, NY
• 2009 Center for Contemporary Printmaking, 7th Biennial Miniature Print Exhibition, international juried exhibition, Norwalk, CT
• 2008 Lake Placid Center for the Arts, open annual juried exhibition, Lake Placid, NY
• 2008 Focus New Jersey, juried state exhibition, Art Center of Northern New Jersey
• 2008 LUC Print Biennial IV, national juried exhibition, Loyola University Chicago
• 2007 18th Annual New Jersey Small Works Show, juried state exhibition, Mikhail Zakin Gallery, Demerest, NJ
Selected Artist Talks and Workshops
• 2024 Upcoming: Guest Artist, Salon series, Strand Center for the Arts, Plattsburgh, NY • 2023 Guest artist, SUNY Potsdam, LoKo Arts Festival, Potsdam, NY • 2019 Guest artist, Northwoods School, Lake Placid, NY • 2018 Invited juried participant, New York Foundation for the Arts, “Artist as Entrepreneur” Bootcamp, Lake Placid, NY
• 2017 Co-juror, Lake Placid Center for the Arts, open annual juried exhibition
• 2016 Featured artist, Modern Printmaking, by Sylvie Covey, Penguin Random House, publisher • 2012 Featured artist, Photoshop for Artists, by Sylvie Covey, Penguin Random House, publisher
Education • Parsons School of Design/The New School, BFA in Illustration
Contact: millstein.janet@gmail.com
Represented by Gallery46 in Lake Placid, NY