Color is at the heart of artist Carol Aronson-Shore’s paintings. Her vision of how color shapes pictorial light and space is central to her New England landscapes and seascapes. This same dramatic use of color and form also shapes the space where she lives in the historic South End of Portsmouth, New Hampshire.

Her latest series of paintings captures the old houses, gardens, and winding pathways of Strawbery Banke Museum, just a short distance from her home. “The artist skillfully—almost surreptitiously—draws the observer into these dazzling color-drenched canvases,” writes Kimberly Alexander, chief curator at Strawbery Banke Museum, in a book on the

artist’s work.

The same description could apply to Carol’s home and garden. Entering this sun-lit space is like stepping into a canvas of her work. The original house was built circa 1790, the same era as many of the Strawbery Banke houses that she paints. Carol’s salmon-pink clapboard house harmonizes with the colonial colors of its nearby neighbors. It is set back slightly from the brick sidewalk and surrounded by a low cream-colored wood fence.

She and her husband, Barry Shore, both professors at the University of New Hampshire, bought the house in 1985. “It was in very bad shape and had been on the market for a long time,” Aronson-Shore says. “But we could both see the possibilities and we knew that it had good bones. After three successive renovations, we were able to take a home from three centuries ago and make it function in the present.”

The hallmark of these South End houses is that each is unique. Carol describes the rooms as having a human scale. Shipbuilders in the off-season built many of these homes, and Shore’s long, curved staircase banister with its playful motif of carved curlicues is probably a refined example of their work. The wave-like curves are a theme that is echoed throughout the house and in the curve of the garden wall and flower beds.

The latest renovation is a kitchen extension designed by architect Robert Rodier of Portsmouth, New Hampshire, and built on the footprint of a former deck. The idea was to create an interior courtyard garden surrounded by the kitchen extension and the renovated garage/studio at the rear of the property.

“The restoration was designed to create a conversation between old and new,” Aronson-Shore says. In an open-space layout, the sleek, modern kitchen harmonizes with the original kitchen fireplace and bread oven on the opposite wall.

Aronson-Shore brings sunlight into the new kitchen, using pale yellow as the dominant color for walls and trim. It coordinates with the blue and yellow Deruta Italian dinnerware in the dining area that bridges the kitchen and living room space.

Views of the garden are framed like paintings through a wall of south-facing windows. Glass doors lead out to a blue-stone curved terrace. “The idea was to create a private oasis or secret garden that offers a peaceful respite from the city streets and close proximity of neighboring houses,” Aronson-Shore says.

The artist wanted a more organic shape and flow for the small garden area. She stood at the top of the garden and drew a curve where the stone terrace would eventually be built. The stone mason, Toby Parke, then scored the curve in the soil with the heel of his shoe. “It is not unlike what you do with a painting,” Carol says. “First, you see it in your mind’s eye, and then render it on canvas—or in this case, in the soil.”

The garden began to take shape with its curves and level changes. Next came the planting. “You start with an initial idea, and then happy accidents cause you to go in different directions,” Aronson-Shore says. “By the time you are finished, you are in a very different place from where you began.”

Like her paintings, Carol Aronson-Shore’s garden is all about color. She selected her color palette from a family of colors that coordinate and repeat throughout the garden. Shades of lavender and purple predominate and coordinate with the salmon-pink walls of the house and plum-purple accent trim.  In early spring, the garden is filled with lavender creeping phlox. As the season progresses, peach-hued poppies balance blue-purple salvia and deep blue lupines. Later colors are even more intense.

“If you throw a shadow on peach, it turns red-purple,” Carol explains. “Purple is a combination of red and blue, while the peach-colored clapboards are a near opposite on the color wheel. That’s why purple vibrates visually against peach.”

The garden also features different shades of green. Gardening taught Carol about the use of greens—the grey-green of lamb’s ears, yellow-green hostas, and bright green ferns. “I play those subtle differences in color throughout the garden,” she says.

The only color that Carol does not use in the garden is yellow, because it is too strong for the space. Instead, she uses yellow in the kitchen as a light source. She explains that red, yellow, and blue are the three primary colors. “Using these three colors creates a flow from the inside to the outside,” she adds.

Like her paintings in the Strawbery Banke series, the house and garden create an interplay among color, light, shadow, and shape. “Whether in a painting, a home, or a garden, color is the organizing principle,” she says.

Carol Aronson-Shore sees a lot of similarities between gardening and painting. “If anything, gardening is more complex. Painting is more static—you stand out in front and paint,” she says. “With gardening, we are not in control of

so many natural elements. So much depends on light, water, temperature, and seasons. That invariably leads to some happy surprises.”

A painting of the yellow Jackson House at Strawbery Banke, with its glowing light and elongated shadows, hangs in Carol’s new kitchen. “Living through a series of renovations gave me a better appreciation for the houses I paint at Strawbery Banke in the Shape of Color series,” she says. “My house and garden renovation merges with my paintings, and each illuminates the other.”