CREATIVE BEGINNINGS. Carrie has been creating all her life. Having grown up on the beaches of Southern California as one of nine children, she continues to be heavily influenced by the sea. She’s spent the last 41 years in Oregon studying and creating her versions of fish, waves, water, birds and wildlife.

Her early years were spent as a graphic designer which cemented her love for positive and negative shapes and spaces. While working on her BA at Marylhurst University, her focus was on printmaking, but it was a soft pastel painting class that opened her up to a new medium. She now also designs in copper, creating ornaments, which is a direct nod back to her graphic design roots. Her studio is in Clackamas County and it’s called The Studio on the Knoll. After years of teaching printmaking and painting, she’s retired from that part of her career and focuses on her art.

ARTISTIC PATH. Carrie’s artwork can be found around the world, having done commissions as far away as Japan. Most recently she was juried in to shows around the Pacific Northwest: Art in the Pearl, Wild Arts Festival, Local 24, and Anacortes Arts Festival to name a few. Having had gallery representation throughout the PNW, she now calls 301 Gallery home, and is thrilled to be a guest artist there.

CREATIVE PROCESS. All Carrie’s work is rooted in basic shapes and forms and she is open-minded to trying new media, and finding solutions when working in mixed media. She creates her own patinas for her copper works using mostly borax, water, salt, vinegar and fire. She’s created a proprietary way to fuse pastels with wax in her paintings, and loves the challenges she finds herself surrounded by. Sketching, capturing reference photos, sitting and simply looking are all part of her process.

CONNECTIONS
Bachelor of Arts, Marylhurst University
Northwest Pastel Society (NPS), Signature Member
Pastel Society of Southern California