Katie Brines

I am a painter based in northern Virginia, originally from the windy, watery landscape of northern Michigan. My work is rooted in a deep reverence for the natural world—its textures, rhythms, and quiet transformations. I create paintings that reflect my interest in the intersections between nature, memory, and domestic life.

The cycles of the year are foundational to both my process and the emotional tone of my work. I often say that I paint with the seasons—not as metaphor, but as lived experience. Growing up in a region marked by distinct seasonal shifts has shaped the way I observe and make. These transitions—between dormancy and bloom, light and dark, interior and exterior—continue to influence my studio rhythm and subject matter.

For example, my painting 'Hinterland' was created in conversation with the shift from late summer to fall. It carries the warmth and density of harvest season and includes drawn motifs from my rural childhood: a clothesline, a wicker basket, and the patterns from my late Mother’s rug collection. These elements serve as both personal references and broader symbols of domestic labor—quiet, often invisible work. I return to these motifs often, not out of nostalgia, but to recognize the depth and meaning in daily tasks, and how they echo the seasonal cycles of the natural world.

This connection between nature and domesticity is central to my work. I'm interested in how wild landscapes and the intimacy of home coexist, how both spaces hold memory and transformation. Repeated motifs—plant forms, footprints, clothes drying in the sun, brooms—form a visual vocabulary that moves across pieces. These images build a personal iconography that overlaps between external environment and internal experience.

'In Spring’s Forest' explores the tension between winter and spring in northern places. It captures the instability of thaw—when snow lingers even as new growth pushes through. That moment, when change is both visible and uncertain, reflects something emotional as well: the hesitations of becoming, the pull of past and future. The painting is both landscape and metaphor, holding the quiet push of seasonal and emotional transition.

My process mirrors these ideas of slow change and accumulation. I work on multiple pieces simultaneously—often ten or more—allowing the work to evolve as a group. This method encourages a dialogue among the paintings, with marks, imagery, and gestures repeating, shifting, and building across surfaces. Layering, erasing, and redrawing become ways of thinking and remembering—less about arriving at a fixed image than about building a history into each piece.

Ultimately, I make paintings that invite reflection and attention. I’m interested in what lingers just beneath the surface—what we remember, what we inherit, and how the rhythms of the natural world continue to shape our internal lives. My work seeks to honor the small, the cyclical, and the often-unseen forces that sustain us.

WHERE TO FIND MY WORK:

QUIRK GALLERY IN RICHMOND, VIRGINIA

ELDER PIPER BEER IN PETOSKEY, MI

IN NOVEMBER AT THE 32ND NORTHERN VIRGINIA CHRISTMAS MARKET IN CHANTILLY, VA NOVEMBER 7TH - 9TH: FRIDAY & SATURDAY FROM 10:00 - 6:00, & SUNDAY 10:00-5:00

IN NOVEMBER AT THE WOODBRIDGE CHRISTMAS MARKET & HOLIDAY CRAFT SHOW IN STONEBRIDGE AT POTOMAC TOWN CENTER: FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 21ST FROM 5:00 - 9:00 PM

IN DECEMBER AT THE OLD BUSTHEAD BREWERY HOLIDAY MARKET AT 7134 FARM STATION RD, WARRENTON, VA 20187: SATURDAY, DECEMBER 6TH FROM 12:00 - 5:00 PM

IN DECEMBER AT THE NATIONAL HARBOR CHRISTMAS MARKET & HOLIDAY CRAFT SHOW AT NATIONAL HARBOR, MD: SATURDAY, DECEMBER 13TH FROM 12:00 - 6:00 PM