The Portrait Collective (KJ Bateman, Peggy Murphy, Cynthia Yatchman)

The Portrait Collective (aka Portrait Replacement Collective) is KJ Bateman, Peggy Murphy, and Cynthia Yatchman. We use a broad range of collaborative processes including shared subject matter, material usage, and themes. Deeper dives into collaboration have included singular pieces involving exquisite corpse technique, collaborative collage, and contrasting narratives. During the pandemic, a round robin of 9 × 12 collage collaborations circulated via mail, which were then put through weekly critiques on Zoom. Our approach as to when a work is “finished” is predicated on a unanimous decision—usually, but not always, uncontentious! With long-shared personal histories (friends, schoolmates, and drawing companions for over 20 years), our uniquely diverse artistic styles and references are easily and often unconsciously interwoven into our work.

KJ Bateman makes prints, paintings, and collages where she melds observed life and invented space into her own quirky expressionist style. She’s lived in Washington, D.C., Colorado, Germany, Pennsylvania, and California where she earned a B.F.A from the University of Southern California. She moved to Washington state to attend the University of Washington M.F.A. program where she was fortunate to study under Jacob Lawrence. She has exhibited at the Whatcom Museum, CoCA, Seattle Design Center, Bellevue Art Museum, and Theater Schmeater and has work in public collections in Shoreline, Auburn, and Kent, Washington.

@kjbatemanart

Peggy Murphy is a resident of Seattle Washington. She received a BFA from the University of Washington where she studied painting and printmaking. Her work is influenced by gestural abstraction, surrealism and often references nature, biology and landscape. She is a current member of Shift Gallery and has shown her work throughout the Northwest.

@pmurphyart

Cynthia Yatchman is an accomplished Seattle-based painter and printmaker whose career spans over 30 years. Her art celebrates the unification found in transformational dichotomies. Exhibitions include shows at Harborview Hospital, Seattle University, Seattle Pacific University, Shoreline Community College, and the Tacoma and Seattle Convention Centers. Her work has been published in online galleries including Grey Cube, Blue Koi, J Mane, Fusion Art, Light Space and Time Art Gallery Ring, and in print/online literary journals including Unleash Lit, The Words Faire, Prachya Review, Saranac Review, J Moonday Mag, Pinyon Review, Modern Literature, Congruence Journal of Literature and Art, Kestrel, Chestnut Review. She is a member of the Seattle Print Art Association, Puget Sound Group Northwest Artists, CoCA, and Women Painters of Washington.

@cynthiayatchman