When Stephanie Taylor, a senior studio arts and art history major, received a $3,500 Brackenridge research grant this summer, she wasn’t focused on making new art. She wanted to rework what already existed.

“I did summer research and I am currently trying to make sense of it,” Taylor said. “The work is about reusing imagery to make something else out of the initial imagery.

Taylor, who usually paints portraits to make money, focuses on printmaking and screen printing in classes, exploring how multiples can interact with each other.

“Usually, I take what’s there and I push it forward. And I try to enhance the mood with color and shading,” she said.

During her time at Pitt, Taylor’s art has been featured in the Spring 2015 Studio Arts Student Exhibition, this spring’s Physics Artist in Residency Award Program (where she made art that reacted to the physics department’s research) and the Studio Arts Summer 2016 Creative Research Exhibition. In its first Artist Spotlight, The Pitt News asked Taylor to talk about the inspiration behind her latest work.

To look at Taylor’s work and read about it, click the first photo to open up a captioned slide show.

Gallery • 8 Photos

"Lisa and Dennis": A recreation of a portrait taken on the couple’s 30th wedding anniversary. The husband in the painting, Dennis, gave Taylor a tiny picture that was taken outside on the night of their wedding. Taylor isolated their faces and made the background out of focus like a gradient of dark colors. By blurring out background details, she wanted to focus in on the figures.