After being told time and again that her paintings looked like the work of the American Impressionists, Jan Dilenschneider, who lives on Long Island Sound in Darien, took a trip up to Old Lyme.

“I went to the Florence Griswold Museum and walked down to the Lieutenant River and said, ‘Oh, my,’ and started snapping photos and drawing little pictures,” Dilenschneider says. “It’s so enchanting. I’ve actually fallen in love with the American Impressionists.”

As she continued driving around the area, along the river and into Hamburg Cove, she had to pull over and take one picture after another of the same landscapes that inspired the Lyme Art Colony Impressionist painters.

“The scene had an inner glow of the water against the trees, so I wanted to get that down,” Dilenschneider says. “I just love that there is a certain melody between the greens. The beauty of the area is so wonderful.

“I started painting and let the painting take me where it’s going, so it’s not a literal interpretation,” she explains.

The result is a new series of paintings by Dilenschneider that capture the spirit and color palette of Impressionism infused with the bold, gestural strokes of Expressionism. It will be on exhibit, along with other current work by the artist, in the Lyme Academy College of Fine Art’s Sill House Gallery through Nov. 12, opening with a public reception on Oct. 7.

The title of the show, “The 4th Dimension,” refers to what the creative process is all about for Dilenschneider.

“What it is, is the participation and emotional reaction of a person when (he or she) sees a painting,” Dilenschneider says. “An individual looking at a work isn’t looking for photorealism in a painting of an apple, they’re looking for their ability to participate in the joy of the painting, to really take something out of it.”

Dilenschneider, who comes from a family of artists, has painted all her life, accumulating a houseful of canvases, but didn’t begin to show and sell her work until the spring of 2013 at a friend’s insistence on purchasing two of her paintings.

In this short time she has had three solo exhibitions in Paris at the Galerie Pierre-Alain Challier, as well as a solo show at the Bellarmine Museum at Fairfield University. She recently returned from Europe where she was the only American artist invited to exhibit at the European Art Fair in Monaco.

This late start in bringing her art into the world may sound strange, but it is entirely logical to the artist, who has attempted to express her artistic sensibility “unhampered by the trends and tyrannies of the art market.”

“If I were told, ‘No more shows, you can’t do this,’ I would just say, ‘More time to paint!’ The actual painting is what is so exciting,” she says. “It’s also important for an artist to let go of the past and always look to the future. I’m not concerned about the art world, just about me, my work.”

Dilenschneider admits that she did get “hooked” on the idea that someone would see her work and respond to it.

“I really want people to feel what I’m feeling when I paint a tree, not to see a tree, reproduced like a photograph.” 

Painting priorities

There are two things Dilenschneider says are very important to her in the process of creating a painting. One is expression and gesture.

“I don’t want a painting to be stagnant, left-right,” she says. “Yesterday, I started with a big blob of paint, gestured through it with my hand because the angle creates some interest. Gesture is very important — it’s the excitement in everything.”

The other is color.

“The poetry and joy comes from the color and a great deal of what the Impressionists did was because of the (advent of) the camera, they were freed up from making things look realistic — ‘Why should we do the same thing the camera is doing?’ They were using new theories. Until then painters were painting in either early or late morning light. The Impressionists said, ‘What’s wrong with midday light?’ Their palette went way up, eliminating black.”

In her own work, she likes to create simultaneous contrast, an idea conceived by a chemist in the 1850s.

“When you put two complimentary colors next to each other, what you get is one color that actually changes your perception of both colors. (For example,) yellow is cheerful, blue is calm and peaceful. Put the two together and they ‘sing’ and it changes your perception of what that color is. It’s one of the things the Impressionists studied —the idea of putting yellow and blue next to each other to create the effect of green grass.” 

Endless experimentation

Dilenschneider loves experimenting with new techniques. After seeing Hamburg Cove on a misty day, she started a new technique to replicate the feeling it evoked.

“Basically, I warm my hands with a lot of linseed oil and take them up and press them onto a canvas that already has some paint on it. And it creates a kind of broken edge and you feel like you’re looking slightly into mist.”

Another new technique used in her paintings “Organic Ribbons” and “Lush Organics” (in the exhibit) are done by tinting the whole canvas a brownish purple or dark blue. She particularly likes to use Gamboge in these paintings — a Cambodian golden yellow originally made with mashed-up crickets.

“I use a squeegee to kind of dance across the canvas and create these angles, pure gestures, pure fun,” she says. “I want to create pure organic forms so people will look at organic forms and realize how beautiful even the smallest leaf or blade of grass can be.”

Dilenschneider believes artists have a platform to draw attention to climate change issues, such as the potential destruction of the beautiful vistas in Lyme, as well as those near her own home in Fairfield County.

But she wants to evoke that response directly from her art, not by making political statements.

“I want people to fall in love with nature again,” she says. “But I don’t want to agitate or be revolutionary. I want people to want to take better care of the planet.”

IF YOU GO

What: “The 4th Dimension,” an exhibition by Jan Dilenschneider

Where: Sill House Gallery, Lyme Academy College of Fine Arts, 84 Lyme St., Old Lyme

When: A free opening reception will be held Oct. 7 from 5 to 7 p.m. The exhibit is on view through Nov. 12. The gallery is open Mon.–Sat., 10 a.m.-4 p.m.

Related event: Gallery Lecture: “Extending the Fourth Dimension”; Oct. 27, from 6 to 8 p.m. Dilenschneider will discuss her work, as well as the work of American Impressionists, and the importance of Lyme in providing an environment that was both inspirational and nurturing for artists. Reception at 6 p.m., lecture at 7 p.m.; $15 for both. Open to public but limited seating, reservations required.

Info and reservations: Visit www.lymeacademy.edu or call (860) 434-3571, ext. 121.