Natalie Gaidry

Natalie Gaidry Born in Houma, Louisiana in 1961 and raised on Residence Plantation, Natalie A. Gaidry began her career as an artist when she was two, by painting her younger sister’s hair a bright purple color. She studied Architecture at the University of Oregon before traveling to Italy where she pursued parallel studies in architecture and painting. From the start her creative talent continued to develop, taking her through numerous stages to her current vibrant and markedly personal style. Basic to Natalie Gaidry’s art from the beginning has been the need to communicate directly with the viewer. It is this urgency that is the basis of her art. Objects are distorted, and colors are intensified. This, Gaidry is telling us, is how reality appears to an artist with a keen sensibility for all that is visually arresting in our world. The details of what surrounds us are not as important, or, at least, not as interesting. The artist’s eye is impressed by the contrasting colors, while her mind is conjuring fantastic images out of the shapes around her. Natalie’s work is rich in artistic diversity ranging from the passionate brush stokes of the European Expressionists through the bold color of the Fauves- Matisse, Andre Derain and Raoul Dufy. With intensity reminiscent of Van Gogh, Gaidry borrows and reconstructs imagery from the everyday using the moving power of color, shape, abstraction and representation to express the visual world seen everyday by everyone. Hers is a passion for the world as it is, but it is a passion matched by a relentless drive to make the enigma of simple experience more habitable and genial. “Everything is striving to create a balance. That is what I try to do in my work. I try to take all of these forces and put them together in a harmonious. way. The result is a canvas with a powerful visual impact.”

Natalie’s “The Ropes in the Barn has been added to the permanent collection of the New Orleans Museum of Art.
Natalie participated in the invitational show “Salon d’Automne” in November at Silverman Studios
New Orleans Museum of Art, permanent collection
Solo Exhibitions 2000 The Waiting Room Gallery New Orleans, Louisiana 1997
Pieces Gallery New Orleans, Louisiana 1991
Robert Allman Gallery Seattle, Washington
Group Exhibitions 2000 Jonathan Ferrara Gallery New Orleans, Louisiana 1998
Astoria Gallery New Orleans, Louisiana 1995
Fiera di Roma Rome, Italy 1993
Giorgi Gallery Berkeley, California
Education
2006 – present  New Orleans Academy of Fine Art
1992 Bachelor of Fine Art University of Washington
1987 Rochester Institute of Technology Art Classes
1985-86 University of Oregon Studied architecture at master’s level
1984 Bachelor of Landscape Architecture Louisiana State University