France Garrido

Art of Imagination

There have been great influences in my life which have inspired my artistic growth.

Nature and Spirit are key to that growth. I have been influenced by visionary and surrealist schools of art, Salvador Dalí, Joseph Cornell, Dorothea Tanning, Remedios Varo, Jorge Gonzalez Camarena, Hannah Hoch, and Indigenous cultures, et al.

I began using the circle, Mandalas, when my awareness of the earth, feminine nature and spirit commenced. I work on an intuitive and meditative level and let the piece speak to me during the process.

To awaken/nudge/shift the subconscious.

Seduction into another world… A world of vision and dream.

I am a visionary artist and a teaching artist. Some of my most powerful and profound teaching experiences were working as a teaching artist in tandem with therapists. Utilizing the power of trust, imagination and art making, with those who were profoundly ill, abandoned, abused, women & children of domestic violence and human trafficking!

The imagination, whether used as a healing modality or as a studio experience, is a way into a deep and extraordinary space and a way out of traumatic unutterable experiences. It is a place of deep expression where the imagination has a home and a voice. Imagination, truth and healing go hand in hand, it is the gift. Imagination is freedom the to be our authentic selves in a most profound way, to explore and melt into sheer Magic!

France Garrido is a visual artist best known for her highly detailed and intricate collage/mixed media works that exemplify the Surrealist & Visionary genre, and a Board Member of the Society for Art of Imagination working with artist and Society founder, Brigid Marlin, to promote Visionary Art and the Societies involvement in the movement.

Society for Art of Imagination

Society for Art of Imagination

• Fosters the resurgence of interest in imaginative and sacred art.
• Continues to create and maintain a community of support for its members.
• Encourages technical skill coupled with imagination to create fine works of art that transcend the ordinary.
• Curates virtual and live exhibitions for its members.

This art may be called by many names – Fantastic Realism, Surrealism, Magic Realism, Visionary Art, Cosmic Art and Inspirational Art.

Art of Imagination is two-fold. It is the “art”: the skill and techniques evolved over centuries and the “imagination” meaning the vision of the artist.

Abbreviated History:

1945: The Vienna School of Fantastic Realism, was founded by Ernst Fuchs. Fuchs attends the Vienna Academy of Art and journeys to Paris. He begins research and experimentation, resulting in the rediscovery of the Misché Technique; painting with egg-tempera and oil glazes.

Studying with Fuchs, Venosa, Klarwein, Askew, Brigid Marlin, Ossberger, Olga Speigel, resulting in a new Worldwide Art Movement.

1961: Artists from England form Inscape Group: Diana Hesketh, Peter Holland, Brigid Marlin, Jack Ray and Steve Snell. Three of us artists got together and we started a Society which became the Society for Art of Imagination.

Brigid Marlin meets Ginny Rogers and Ann Oestriecher. They both loved Imaginative Art, and she found our US Patrons who helped to found a charity, the American Society for Art of Imagination. This donation enabled us to put on a prestigious exhibition in the Mall Galleries in London.

1966: Brigid Marlin, studies with Fuchs and learns the Misché Technique. Received with enthusiasm by members of Inscape who begin to work with and teach the technique.

1968: The Inscape group was invited by Fuchs to Wartholz Castle, to exchange ideas and work together experimenting with old and newly evolved techniques.

1993: Professor Ernst Fuchs summoned some of the Inscape artists to meet at Grafenegg Castle to discuss the way forward to promote the Art of Imagination. He asked each artist to work towards this end. He had founded The Ernst Fuchs Museum in the villa built by Otto Wagner, and was planning an International Museum for Fantastic Art at the Saxe-Coburg Palais in Vienna.

1997: Inscape International expands its membership and works to promote Imaginative Art worldwide. Changing its name to The Society for Art of Imagination. Fuchs as Honorary President.

1999: The Erlangen Museum near Nurnberg, Germany, arranges an exhibition “Phantastik am Ende der Zeit” by Dr. Christine Ivanovic. Members of The Society for Art of Imagination are included.

2001: H.R. Giger as Honorary Patron, invited Vonn Stropp, and members of the Society to visit him in Switzerland, and travel to the H.R. Giger Museum at Gruyeres.

2022: The Society continues to support and encourage the voices of many Visionary, Spiritual and Surrealistic artists in their pursuit of the cultivation of their Imagination!