About the Artist

Art has been a means of expression in my life since early childhood. From the blending of colors---whether crayons, pastels, oils or watercolors---as I evolved from child to adult, I have been enchanted with colors and the brilliance of light as it plays and dances within a scene. Even as a child, I was an observer of the world around me, trying to memorize for future use, the colors of a sunset, the tones of the rolling Palouse wheat fields of eastern Washington, or the ever changing colors of the forested mountains and sky above pristine Priest Lake, in northern Idaho.

In 1968, I graduated from Washington State University with a minor in Art. My focus at that time was in the medium of oil. For the next 27 years, my painting experience was juxtapositioned with the responsibilities of teaching Kindergarten in the early years and then raising five sons. In 1995, when our youngest child entered Kindergarten, I took the opportunity to sign up for a watercolor class, studying under well known northwest artist, Stan Miller, and thus began my renewal in the joys of painting. Watercolor is magical…the perfect medium to capture the brilliant colors of special places in this world we all call “home”.

When my husband and I travel with our sons, I am captivated by places we pass by --- whether a garden, a storefront, or a courtyard. I am continually awed by the beauty bequeathed to us by God. I have been privileged to glimpse some of those places at just the right moment and feel compelled to share those moments that delighted me with others, that they too might know the beauty that lies around us always!

~Renée Rigsby