Artist Bio

As an artist, I try to bring a sense of calm to the viewer.  Perhaps my style is inspired realism, going a step further to connect on a spiritual level.  Coming from an artistic family, I was encouraged to draw and create as soon as I could hold a crayon.  I was raised in Gainesville, Florida.  After college, I enjoyed a career in music and art.  My husband’s military career took us around the world, giving me a varied backdrop to paint and draw.  I stayed busy with commissioned works, book and magazine illustrations, set designs, and creating just for the sheer joy of it.  I now reside just south of Jacksonville in the Saint Johns community.

From an early age I was inspired by the classics; Gainsborough, Monet, Winslow Homer, and Van Gogh.  Now as a mature artist, I am drawn to Henry VonGenk III, C. Ford Riley, A. E. Backus, Peter Pettegrew, Mary Jane Volkmann, and Sydney McKenna; all Florida landscape artists.  Growing up in Florida, I have fallen in love with our beautiful skies, marshes, and wildlife.  One of my current series, “Florida Horizons” celebrates this desire to call attention to the Florida that I grew up with, the Florida that is slipping away, and the Florida that is around us everyday.  Other current series are “Florida Fairways,” “The Heavens,” and “Nancy Elizabeth.” 

All of my paintings are originals.  I like the viewer to appreciate the one of kind nature of my work in a world of prints and giclees.  I paint in acrylics because of the versatility of the medium.  I like the immediacy of their purest form, but I will also use various other mixing media to make the acrylics more closely mimic oil paints “Artists block” is not part of my vocabulary.  There are never enough hours in the day to work on my next project.  What a great profession to have.

I am represented by eleven galleries along both coasts of Florida.  A few of my exhibitions this year have included The Catherine Butler Gallery, Sarasota, GTM National Estuarine Research Reserve, Ponte Vedra Beach, Hollywood City Hall, Hollywood, Sunart Gallery, Punta Gorda, and the GFAA Show, Presidents Gallery, Gainesville.  A few of my future shows include the A.E. Backus Museum and Gallery, Fort Pierce, ACT Gallery, Fort Myers, Rookery Bay, Naples, and The Haskell Gallery, Jacksonville International Airport.  For more information click here...www.asbellarts.com

I have had articles published about my life and my art in publications such as SouthernLiving.com, the Florida Times Union, Folio, The Florida Lupus Chapter Newsletter, etc.  Many of these articles have focused on how my health has steered my career.  After suffering a stroke and being diagnosed with Lupus in 1996, I had to learn to paint and create music again.  One of my great desires is to use my art to draw attention to the disease of Lupus.  It is often misunderstood and seldom given the funding or attention it warrants.  I am now a facilitator for a local Lupus Support Group.

It is a joy to use my talents to benefit charities such as the American Diabetes Association, Florida Hospice, Habitat for Humanity, Easter Seals, and the AIDS Foundation.  As a lupus survivor, I am an advocate for lupus awareness and 10% of all my proceeds go to the Lupus Foundation of America, Greater Florida Chapter.  If lupus is my lemons, then my artwork is my lemonade.