My Beautiful Grandmother
By Greta Elbogen
Yuko Ueda Groupp
About Yuko Ueda Groupp
“I have been making mixed media paintings on canvas and paper. Inspiration comes from nature, life and the human spirit. Personal visual experiences of color and form in nature are the deepest motives of my art work.
Poetic memory fragments – such as vibrant flowers, wild berries’ vivid red in the winter field, or stormy sky, dark grey following a rainbow, clouds shines over the water – are often recalled as elements and appear on my canvases. It is not a record, but an appearance.
Collected small man-made materials and natural pieces are incorporated onto canvases. It is a joy to see all the individual colors and materials harmonize altogether spontaneously under certain control.”
-Yuko Ueda
Yuko Ueda Groupp was born in Fukuoka, Japan in June 1976. Her parents were both accomplished artists. Her father, Hiroyuki Ueda is an accomplished published and very active watercolor plein air painter who paints and teaches in Fukuoka, Japan. Her mother was a potter and ceramicist.Yuko grew up in a house with a kiln, surrounded by art and artists.
She studied art and design at Tama Art University in Tokyo and received a bachelor’s degree in Fine Art and Graphic Design. In 2004 she moved to New York to attend the Art Students League. Yuko studied Fine Art and focused on abstract painting under the mentorship and guidance of her teachers Bruce Dorfman, Ronnie Landfield and William Scharf. Yuko became a member and was awarded many grants and scholarships including Reginald Marsh and Felicia Meyers Marsh Merit Scholarship, The Lloyd Sherwood Grant and the Kuniyoshi Award, Sara and Yasuo Kuniyoshi Foundation. Yuko’s work is also part of the League’s permanent collection.During her years at the League, Yuko worked with the design department from 2006-2014. She created elegant designs for both Linea and Lines of the League.
Yuko will be deeply missed by her friends, co-workers, instructors and her fellow students.