Drawing and writing form the foundation of my abstract painting practice. In 2016, I became fascinated with drawing on my phone, posting a digital sketch on Instagram each day. Over time, after creating more than a thousand drawings, the geometric language that emerged became the basis for a series of oil paintings. Although the drawings are no longer posted on Instagram, a selection can be seen here. My work is characterized by a tendency toward Casualism, a term I coined in an article published in The Brooklyn Rail to describe an approach to painting that values imperfection, incompleteness, and process over traditional color theory, pleasing composition, and polished forms.
In 2025, as the world began to fall apart, I started wondering if the language of geometric abstraction that I had developed over the years could convey something about vulnerability. I started working with water-based media, soaking raw canvas, and using printmaking techniques to create irregularly shaped geometries that suggest dissolution.The process seems to mimic how we absorb experience into memory.
While I was a professor at Eastern Connecticut State University (2000-13), I was drawn to the intersection of art, writing, and emerging digital platforms. I started an online studio project called Two Coats of Paint, which has grown into an award-winning blogazine dedicated to painting.
At its core, my work is driven by a deep curiosity about the mysterious interplay between emotion, intellect, and the act of painting itself.
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Sharon Butler (b. 1959, New London, Connecticut) grew up in Stonington, Connecticut, and moved to Williamsburg, Brooklyn, after earning degrees at Tufts University (BA), Massachusetts College of Art, (BFA), and the University of Connecticut (MFA). She has held solo exhibitions in NYC at CLEA RSKY, Jennifer Baahng Gallery, Theodore Gallery, Pocket Utopia, and Central Fine Arts; in Connecticut at Slater Memorial Museum, University of Connecticut, Real Art Ways, and Furnace Art on Paper Archive; in Seattle at SEASON. Her work has been featured in publications such as The Brooklyn Rail, Hyperallergic, artcritical, The New Criterion, and New York Magazine. She has received awards from Creative Capital and the Warhol Foundation, Yaddo, Connecticut Commission on the Arts, and the Pollock-Krasner Foundation.
She lives and works in Long Island City, Queens, New York, and New London, Connecticut.
CV of Exhibitions and awards
CV of Writing and other projects
Image: In the studio, Long Island City, Queens, NY, May 2025