North Kingstown, R.I. resident a candidate for Watson Fellowship

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Brittany Gilbert (Photo by Union College)

SCHENECTADY, NY (02/08/2012)(readMedia)-- Brittany Gilbert of North Kingstown, R.I. was recently named as one of Union College's candidates for the Thomas J. Watson Fellowship.

The Thomas J. Watson Fellowship Program offers a one-year grant to graduating college students "of unusual promise" to study independently outside the United States. The stipend for individual award winners is $25,000.

Gilbert's project is titled "Landscape Impressions: Chasing the Light." Gilbert is fascinated by how landscapes are transformed by light, weather and the seasons.

"Oil painting and the plein-air movement have always been an integral part of my life," says Gilbert, whose paintings are on view through Feb. 19 at the Wikoff Student Gallery in the Nott Memorial. "The best way to capture a scene is to personally experience it with all your senses."

Gilbert would like to hone her technique and open a cross-cultural dialogue with other artists in Argentina, Australia, Brazil, England, Ireland, Japan, the Netherlands, Norway and Tanzania. "Taking Western artistic practices to other cultures to compare them to local artistic traditions will give me a new perspective on the world," she says.

Gilbert, a senior, is majoring in visual arts and minoring in French and art history.

"The Watson Fellowship is an extraordinary opportunity for our students and a great privilege for us," said visual arts professor David Ogawa, chair of Union's Watson Fellowship Committee. "It makes it possible for students to explore the passions they have developed here at Union."

At Union, Gilbert is also a Mandeville Gallery assistant, co-captain of the women's tennis team, a member of the Student-Athlete Advisory Committe and the Outing Club.