Contemporary
Tactile Surfaces. Hidden Narratives. Avant-garde mixed-media collages and structural oil & cold wax abstractions designed to visualize spatial presence and inspire visual discovery.
My contemporary practice is a dive into texture, memory, and geographic history. Spanning two distinct disciplines; intricate mixed-media and acrylic collages and sculptural oil & cold wax impressions, this portfolio treats the canvas as a multi-layered archive. Rather than creating flat decorations, I construct physical, tactile environments that provide a physical connection, challenging the viewer to step close and lean into the details.
In my mixed-media collage works, traditional motifs are built over prints of text, map fragments, delicate lace patterns, and handmade papers. These elements hide secret, unlisted illustrative details that slowly reveal themselves over time, reflecting on personal memories or global narratives.
In my modern impressionist works, I combine oils with cold wax. Using stencils, trowels, and tools, I build and scrape away heavy, sculptural layers to capture the raw, gritty resilience of the natural landscapes that inspire me. From the thorny, sun-drenched coastlines of Todos Santos to the winding calligraphic veins of the Baja watersheds seen from 20,000 feet.
Cortez Watershed:
Arroyo Cuesta Nueva
Artist: Lisa Tollner
Medium: Oil and cold wax on archival paper
Dimensions: 11.5x15.25
Price: $1,400
Availability: Available
An aerial exploration of the Baja California peninsula from 20,000 feet. Cortez Watershed: Arroyo Cuesta Nueva tracks the sharp, structural calligraphy of water cutting through an arid landscape of the Sierra de la Laguna mountains. Sculptural layers of cold wax mimic the ancient, deeply eroded canyons, while fine, sharp linework traces the flow of active riverbeds toward the Sea of Cortez. This fiery orange and red composition brings an expansive sense of light, depth, and organic movement.
Cortez Watershed:
Arroyo San Pedrito
Artist: Lisa Tollner
Medium: Oil and cold wax on archival paper
Dimensions: 11.5x15.25
Price: $1,400
Availability: Available
Capturing the sudden emergence of a lush delta oasis from a high-altitude perspective. Cortez Watershed: Arroyo San Pedrito contrasts dense, organic chartreuse and deep emerald tones against structured rock fields. Built with layered oil and cold wax, the highly textured surface embodies the physical landscape of arroyo and the Sierra de la Laguna mountains, showcasing the resilient paths water carves through stone. It functions as a powerful, cooling focal point.
Cortez Watershed:
Arroyo Santiago
Artist: Lisa Tollner
Medium: Oil and cold wax on archival paper
Dimensions: 11.5x15.25
Price: $1,400
Availability: Available
A atmospheric view of the Baja topography slipping into twilight. Cortez Watershed: Arroyo Santiago utilizes rich, deep magentas, violets, and midnight indigos to map the runoff channels heading toward the coast. The fine parallel blue and white lines catch the ambient light dynamically across the heavy, scraped wax surface. Designed to complete the series triptych.
The Cortez Watershed series captures a bird's-eye view of the Baja California peninsula from 20,000 feet. Inspired by the intricate irrigation veins carving their way through the Sierra de la Laguna mountains toward the Sea of Cortez, this oil and cold wax series explores the structural calligraphy of water moving across an arid landscape. Sculptural layers of cold wax mimic the ancient, eroded mountain ranges, while fine, hyper-detailed linework traces the paths of active riverbeds. Spanning three distinct seasonal shifts—from fiery desert ochres to lush oasis greens and atmospheric twilight magentas—this series offers a striking aerial perspective designed to bring a profound sense of depth.
Baja Heat
Oils & Cold Wax
Painted in Todos Santos, Mexico, Baja Heat captures the contrasts of the Baja landscape: intense desert sun, the cooling presence of the distant ocean, and wild vegetation that somehow thrives between the two. Layers of oil and cold wax, softened forms and fragmented marks suggest heat, movement and the resilience of the desert landscape. The painting captures the memory and atmosphere of being there.
Artist: Lisa Tollner
Medium: Oil and cold wax on archival paper, mounted on birch wood panel, ready-to-hang
Dimensions: 11x15
Price: $1,400
Availability: Available
Artist Note
This piece comes from time spent traveling through Baja, where the landscape feels vast but intimate at the same time. I’m drawn to places where elements overlap — desert beside ocean, dryness beside moisture, stillness beside movement. I wasn’t interested in painting the exact location, only the feeling of standing there and noticing how quiet everything became.
The Long Game
Artist: Lisa Tollner
Medium: Mixed Media + Acrylic on archival paper, mounted
on 1" birch wood panel, ready-to-hang
Dimensions: 11x15x1
Price: $1,500
Availability: SOLD - commissioned work
A young athlete rises into the air mid-kick, formed from dozens of hand-placed paper fragments. Around her, women from earlier eras observe — figures whose clothing and roles would never have allowed such freedom of movement. Butterflies surround the player, suggesting both support and transformation. The work reflects the generational journey of women in sport and the unseen presence of those who came before.
This piece considers both progress and the distance still to travel. A soccer player seems almost weightless in motion, while butterflies, maps, diagrams and figures from earlier generations reveal a more complicated story beneath her flight. The layers reference perseverance, limited research into female athletes, societal expectations and the long road toward greater opportunity.
Sifting Through Memories
Artist: Lisa Tollner
Medium: Mixed Media + Acrylic on canvas
Dimensions: 16x20
Price: $2,200
Availability: SOLD - private collection
Sifting Through Memories explores the way food, family and memory become intertwined over time. Fragments of recipes disappear into the tabletop alongside tiny cookbook images and lace-like circles reminiscent of a grandmother’s tablecloth. At the center, vibrant lemons built from handmade papers hold their own small, hidden details, inviting the viewer to come closer and discover what has been tucked into the layers.
I Dreamed of Sunflowers I, II, III
Artist: Lisa Tollner
Medium: Oil + cold wax on archival paper
Dimensions: 11.25x15.25
Price: $1200 each
Availability: Available
Inspired by a vivid dream while in Todos Santos and painted the following day, I Dreamed of Sunflowers is a three-piece exploration of color, movement and organic form. Sunflowers expand, overlap and drift across brilliant fields of turquoise, yellow, orange and green, while looping lines and layered marks create a sense of connection and energy. Each work offers a different view of the same imagined landscape, somewhere between a garden, a memory and a dream.
Rare Beauty
Artist: Lisa Tollner
Medium: Mixed media on canvas
Dimensions: 11x14
Price: $1,250
Availability: Available
Rare Beauty explores the complicated relationship between beauty, rarity and value. Fragments of maps from tropical regions where orchids originated are woven into the leaves and stems, while small female faces emerge from within the blooms. Once exotic and difficult to obtain, orchids are now widely cultivated and traded. The work draws a quiet parallel between the flower and the ways female beauty can also be admired, idealized and ultimately treated as a commodity.
Nature's Equation
Artist: Lisa Tollner
Medium: Mixed media on archival paper, mounted on birch wood panel, ready-to-hang
Dimensions: 8x11
Price: $850
Availability: Available
Beneath the apparent spontaneity of a flower lies an extraordinary system of structure, proportion and repetition. In Nature's Equation, fragments of scientific diagrams and text surround exuberant blooms constructed from layered papers, pattern and expressive marks. The contrast between the analytical and the organic reflects a recurring fascination with the hidden systems that allow something so complex to appear effortless and beautiful.