Nan Van Ryzin

"Ice" - Large Contemporary Abstract Expressionist Oil Painting in Blue Palette

2023

Based in Connecticut, Nan Van Ryzin is an abstract painter whose expansive, emotionally charged canvases speak with the authority of a life lived in extraordinary service to others. Her paintings are large in scale, viscerally textured, and alive with color, carrying within them the accumulated wisdom of a woman who spent decades learning to see beneath the surface of things, to understand what words cannot always reach, and to hold space for the full complexity of human experience. Before devoting herself fully to painting, Nan spent forty years as a behavioral therapist specializing in applied behavior analysis, working with children and adults on the autism spectrum, including those with Asperger's syndrome and a wide range of developmental and behavioral differences. It is work that requires a rare combination of scientific rigor and profound human sensitivity - the ability to observe with precision, to respond with patience, and to remain fully present to another person's inner world even when that world is difficult to access. Alongside this practice, she served as a preschool director and upper elementary Montessori teacher, roles grounded in the belief that every child carries within them an innate capacity for growth, curiosity, and self-expression that the right environment can draw forth. Taken together, these parallel careers represent something deeply unusual: a life built entirely around the patient, attentive, nurturing of others. It is impossible to stand before Van Ryzin's paintings and not feel an imprint of that history. The urgency in her mark-making, the emotional intensity of her color relationships, the sense that something just beneath the surface is pressing outward toward the light - all of it speaks to decades of deep engagement with the full range of human feeling. Working with acrylic paint, plaster, metals, woods, and papers, she builds her canvases with thick, lush passages of material that move across the canvas with the unpredictability of natural forces. In her own words: "I approach each piece with an open mind, allowing my feelings in the moment to guide my choices. This intuitive process is akin to an inner dialogue, where my emotions and instincts interact with the materials at hand. There are no predefined themes or concepts in my work; instead, it is a spontaneous expression of my internal landscape at any given time." Those who encounter her work often find themselves drawn back to it repeatedly, pulled by something they cannot quite name - a quality in the color, the texture, or the sheer physical presence of the surface that continues to reveal itself over time. Deeply influenced by childhood memories and her years living in Europe, California, and the Pacific Northwest, Van Ryzin brings a rich and well-traveled inner life to every canvas. Her paintings are the work of someone who has spent a lifetime paying attention to others, to the world, and finally, fully, to herself.