Lynn Nelson

I began to pursue my interest in art 4 years ago in my retirement after 37 years as a practicing small animal veterinarian. I started with an online drawing course to study the fundamentals of art with the mediums of pencil and charcoal under the mentored guidance of Cindy Wider. Later I expanded into other mediums and discovered a deep connection with pastels and pan pastels. I have always loved nature and the natural world. Being able to capture its glory in a realistic way is my driving ambition. Recently I realized that painting florals make me happy so I will be concentrating on them.

Past exhibitions: Light Space and Time - Seascape competition in September 2021 where I received an Honorable Mention for my artwork titled “Shroud Cay”. Light Space and Time- Primary Colors competition In October/November 2021 where I received a Special Recognition for my artwork Titled “Sea of Cortez Sunset”

Email; lrcvoyager@gmail.com

Renee Switkes

Renée Switkes is a Californian native primarily living in Silicon Valley, where many gardens inspire her work. She is attracted to the contrast of light and shadow. She enjoys mixing colors from a limited pallet to show the opaque surface and the transparency the light provides. Spending time painting flowers help her slow down and enjoy nature's simple beauty and fills her desire for others to feel joy and connect on a deeper level when they view her artwork.

After graduating from San Jose State University, she began teaching the love of art to children of all ages inspiring students to feel comfortable and proud of their creations. She has stayed creative while teaching and raising her family but did not begin exhibiting her paintings until 2021. In two years, her paintings have been exhibited at the Pacific Art League in Palo Alto, Ark Art Gallery in San Jose, the Phantom Gallery in Milpitas, and in San Francisco at The Drawing Room, SoMa Arts, SFWA Gallery, and FOG Gallery. In addition, she received a platinum award from J. Mane Gallery and two bronze awards from Camelback Gallery. Recently her artwork has been accepted into the state-wide competition and salon by the Triton Museum in Santa Clara. Paintings by Renée Switkes are in private collections in France, Switzerland, Hawaii, Arizona, California, Massachusetts, Iowa, and Georgia.

https://www.artbyreneeswitkes.com/

Cherie Lee

Cherie Lee is a multi-media artist whose early work remains part of the United States White House's permanent art collection. Her world-class carved eggshells have been featured in both regional and global exhibitions such as ArtAbility at Bryn Mawr, Rocky Neck Art Colony, Limner Gallery, Montclair Art Museum, and Boomer Gallery UK, among others. She is also a literary contributor to publications including “Critical Moss: Making Artwork Outside the Metropolitan Bubble”, the Co19 Project, Orange County Museum of Art 'Collage Collaborative' and Awakened Voices Literary magazine.

Despite being a permanently disabled single mother, this lifelong, self-taught maker began to pursue her craft professionally only 5 years ago. Investing all efforts, she quickly landed a pivotal residency with Soaring Gardens Artist Retreat, returning frequently by special invitation. However, it was during her residency and fellowship appointments with Bethany Arts Community in NY when her path took yet another dramatic turn.

With the realization that her hunt for a recognizable "brand" was constricting her craft, Lee's current artistic practice has opened up to encompass and allow all of her capacities, and a whole new path is in full bloom.

CherieLeeCreations.com

Sadie Roy

My passion for photography started in high school when I took an elective darkroom class and I have been taking photos ever since. The older I get the greater appreciation I have for the experience of the darkroom in this digital age. Eventually, I gave in and moved from the 35mm to a digital camera but will always have a love for shooting with film. Although I also photograph in color, black and white has always been my personal favorite. Whether it be people, landscapes, or animals, I’ve always found that black and white has a soulful feel and creates a great connection to the subject. Having grown up in and still living in New England I’m never short on great quaint towns or mountains, my favorite place being the White Mountains, to photograph and pull inspiration from whatever catches my eye. Landscape and macro are a large focus, but growing up watching National Geographic also gave me a love for photographing animals including our rescue cats. I never know what will catch my eye and find that the greatest photos come from simply taking time to observe the world around us also something to appreciate in digital times.

www.sadieroyphotography.com

Bruce Block

I relocated to the Pacific Northwest in the late 1990s and instantly became addicted to the natural beauty in the region. I originally was a research engineer in high technology with a specialization in optics and materials. I began exploring photography as a hobby. After retiring from my engineering career in 2016, I have used my engineering experience and love of experimentation to develop novel techniques and embrace technology to advance digital-based photography to new levels and to express my homage to the natural surroundings. My photography is inspired by nature and I enjoy digitally transforming photographs into something unique, different, and bold. Sometimes my experiments lead to something new and exciting, and sometimes they fail. That is the nature of research. But more importantly, sometimes I see nature in a different light.

bruceblockphoto.com

Nikki Coulombe

I grew up in Alberta, Canada, where three years of formal education led to a home-based business in eastern Ontario, working freelance while my children were young. Along with a variety of on-site work for Interior Designers, commissions included fabric design, illustrations, acrylic paintings, portraits, pet portraits, and customized wall murals for homes and restaurants. Volunteer work at schools involved developing educational projects around themes of Art History, multiculturalism, and environmental issues. Modifying style is characteristic of my work, mostly dictated by the subject matter and the unique challenges presented by each individual piece as it unfolds. I work intuitively and don't really have pre-set, predictable methods, except there is a constant concern for negative spaces being as important as the main objects. I'll remove material to create marks, imply structures, backgrounds, and spatial movement, using damp cloth and dry brushes on paintings, pottery tools and fingernails with oil pastels, and different sizes of erasers for work in graphite and soft pastels.

Recently (2020-23) I've been doing large format soft pastels on paper, trying a broad range of subjects portraying some of the amazing places I've traveled to, as represented by animals, plants, terrain details, and landscapes.

nikkiartwork.com

Anastasiia Novitskaya

I am an artist who marvels at the art of living.

My name is Anastasiia Novitskaya. I was born in Ukraine. I have had a passion for drawing since childhood. All the time I was in search of myself. I was not interested in listening to lectures, so I drew sketches in my notebooks. In 2014 I started studying oil painting in the Kyiv Art Gallery where I drew my first paintings. In 2015 I moved to Poland, where I devoted myself entirely to art. I studied contemporary art and met local artists. During this period, I got acquainted with new techniques in painting.

I opened my own cafe in Krakow, this was one of the first places where my paintings were shown. In 2022 I moved to Genoa, Italy. This greatly influenced my paintings, I learned to convey the feeling of being near the sea. My sunsets have become sensual and brighter. I love to experiment, to observe, to discover new aspects of familiar things.

I am constantly searching for myself, my place in this world. Simple words can not convey all the nuances of emotions and experiences. Art for me - is a way to transfer feelings. It is what connects us together and takes communication to the next level - the emotional level. I believe that art is a way to express the inexpressible.

https://artnovitskaya.wixsite.com/home

Andrea Borbély Hellman

"In Seattle's Pike Place Market, I found an abundance of my favorite colors. It was a nippy late-March Saturday morning, and the only thing that kept the outdoor market from feeling like a refrigerator was the light reflecting the warm hues. The florist, an elderly Vietnamese woman dressed in a fur-trimmed parka, was originally included in the composition, but her tiny figure sank grotesquely in the sea of blooms. A dark character in a hooded parka is an odd sight among tulips. This image fit my main theme of depicting warmth and connectedness through the use of colors and texture brushes, which is why I painted it despite my hesitance about creating yet another image of flowers (much as I love them). In order to manipulate the shapes to mold with one another, I worked with over thirty layers before collapsing them into just two: the painting and the knitted lines. I picture this as a mural in front of the Pike Place Market in Seattle."

Andrea is a prolific fine artist, who maintains an online gallery of her works (https://www.andreahellman.com/). Her preferred medium is digital painting although she has worked in oil painting, watercolor, etching, collage, mixed media, and photography. Andrea was a featured artist in Hayden Ferry's Review Issue 72, Spring/Summer, 2023.

Vasu Tolia

Discovering visual art in my retirement has been exciting for me and it has become a passion now. As I am drawn more towards creating beautiful dreamy works combining semi-realism with abstraction, I use blocks of beautiful color in arresting compositions, disrupting continuity at times and layer them with drips also. I am influenced by the nature and the world around me and during my travels. I try to capture the essence of these observations into my artworks.

 This exciting process evolves straight from my heart and I find it very meditative. My style varies from flat application of acrylic color with brushes, straight out of a tube, palette knife etc along with the use of mixed media. I try to evolve my style as I experiment more and more.

https://www.vasutolia.art

Susan Wehrman

"I didn’t set out to become an artist, but my passion for art began early on: in elementary school tempura paints, construction paper, and ordinary glue represented a vision to be fulfilled. While other children longed for toys, my greatest excitement came from visits to the local hobby shop for paint-by-number kits. I would spend many marathon weekends working on these cardboard canvases.

Today, I specialize in pet and nature portraits; my artwork represents the special bond we share with the animals that have etched special places in our hearts.  My mission is to create realism – beyond two-dimensional photographs – I want to portray the spirit and essence of my subjects.  Consequently, most of my work is created in colored pencil, as it affords me this type of precision in rendering fine details."

www.tippany.com