Bio

Education:

I earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts in 1987 Summa Cum Laude and my Master of Fine Arts in Drawing in 1990 Magna Cum Laude - Both degrees were earned at the University of Washington.  I had the honor to be a teaching assistant for 5 of my MFA quarters at the UW. 

My Freshman year of college I was a Presidential Scholar with a full ride scholarship at University of Southern California. 

Health:

I am a professional artist who has been disabled with constant migraine since 2000.  I am also a Cancer Survivor from Uterine Cancer - 15 years Cancer Free.

Polyvore:

I was introduced to the website Polyvore 8 years ago by my dear friend Jillian Venters, The Lady of the Manners at Gothic Charm School. I ended up creating my own digital art style of portraiture using the Polyvore website tools. You can see this work on Pinterest - I have Boards with a lot of the Art Pinned there.

Current Work:

In June of 2014, my husband gave me a new bamboo paper sketch book. This gift led me back to real world drawing for the first time in about 7 years. Since June I have used up over 9 sketchbooks and have done over 300 portrait drawings and illustrations. I started with my favorite comfort media - graphite. With encouragement, I picked up my first color pencils since 1985. My husband gave me a set of PrismaColor Art Pens for Christmas 2014. With these tools I have been creating drawings out of my imagination. I have been working only from life and from photos for almost 30 years. This is a exciting new direction for my art to take and I am thrilled!

Now in 2023 I am working in multimedia: Watercolors, colored pencils, gouache and Open Acrylics and focusing on Portraits.

Art Media:

I have worked in Oils, Water-miscible Oils, Watercolors, Acrylics, Egg Tempera, Pastel, Ink, Encaustic, Monotype Printmaking, Linoleum Block Printing, Color Pencil, Aqua Graphite, Lost Wax Sculpture, Stone Carving, Slip Cast Clay Sculpture, Paper and Fabric Sculpture, Paper Clay, Fabric Painting, Paper Making and Digital Art (Art Rage, Photoshop, Manga Studio, InDesign, Polvore).

Teaching:

I have taught art in schools, community art programs and one on one to students from ages 8 - 80. 

Work History:

Outside Sales, Technical Materials Trainer and Tour Guide for Daniel Smith Artist Materials.

Sales and Merchant Relations at Wizards of the Coast - Illustrated 4 Cards for the game V:TES the Sabbat in 1997.

Sales and Visual Display at Display & Costume Supply 

Sales and Visual Display for the Department Store Frederick & Nelson (I worked during college).

Family History in Art:

I am the proud 3rd out of 4 generations of women artists in my family to earn college art degrees. My grandmother Mildred Gellerman, with her Art Degree from the UW, set up the Seattle School System Art Programs in the 1950's. She also taught at Seattle University. My Aunt Nancy-Lou Gellerman with her degree from the UW was a professor in the Art History and the Art Program at the University of Waterloo, Ontario Canada. My Aunt Margaret Hays who got her MA at the UW Sculpture Dept worked in bas-relief quilting. My niece Kara Nykreim is a Lead Designer at Nike with a degree in Industrial Design from the UW.

I owe my early exposure to art and art history to my mother Joan Nykreim. She came into my schools as I was growing up to teach Art and Creativity. She also worked to build Gifted Child Programs in all of the school systems I and my siblings attended.