GUNNISON & CRESTED BUTTE CREATIVE DIRECTORY
PAINTERS
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Activate Nature - Zach Bauer Original Art
“Activate Nature” is Zach Bauer’s arts production, specializing in Watercolor painting and custom sign design. “Activating your Nature” has become the credo and attempts to explain simply the goal of his arts. Reclaimed/Recycled goods take a large roll in much of his creation. Logo design as well as print and frame services are also available. Zach Bauer has been a Gunnison Valley resident since 2004. He received a BFA in Art at Western State University in 2009. His talents are available on commission and examples can be found in Crested Butte, at Butte Bagels and Resilient Threads Vintage Clothier and at Ripple/Eir Chiro in Gunnison.
Nicholas Reti
Nicholas speaks in the language of visuals, illustrating his thoughts with paintings, concepts expressed with color and content. His travels have taken him all over the planet, including Antarctica, South East Asia, Africa, and Canada. He began showing in Crested Butte in the summer of 2007 during the Arts Festival and has been showing exclusively at Oh Be Joyful Gallery ever since. His smaller studies often are made up of heavier brushstrokes while his larger studio work is more carefully rendered. His use of color evokes his joy of life and the landscape.
Shaun Horne
Shaun Horne is a long time Crested Butte plein air painter. Shaun and his wife Dawn Cohen both make large scale plein air paintings around the valley. Together they own the Shaun Horne Gallery, at 418 Elk Avenue, which represents them, and a handful of national caliber painters, who paint in Crested Butte, but who don’t live here. Shaun has been representing some of the best landscape painters in the country since 2010.
Susan Marrion Art
I am a full-time working artist/oil painter/gallery owner (Crested Butte Fine Art Gallery) and blessed to be surrounded by Crested Butte’s natural beauty for over 25 years. I paint whatever I am pulled to exploring, but I enjoy impressionistic landscapes the most. Since I was a child, I have always felt my happiest and most authentic in nature, spending many childhood days horse back riding through the woods and trails of the northeast, and now as an adult, backpacking and mountain biking in the mountains of Colorado. I was often found observing, contemplating and writing poetry of my impressions, but then was introduced to oil painting in 2004 and the vehicle of expression changed from pen to brush. Attempting to express and share the beauty I see and feel outdoors is why I paint.
Katie Briggs
As a 6th Generation Golden, Colorado Native. I identify with my pioneer ancestors as I explore my voice as an artist through the medium of oil. I embark on every blank canvas as if I were headed on an adventure west. I never know the outcome of each painting, but respect the journey of creating through all of its trials and tribulations. My unique style has been shaped by humorously playing with combining ideas of classic imagery of the West and pieces of today’s pop culture. I’m inspired by the timeless west, whether it be a painting for C.M. Russell, a song from Willie and Waylon, or just a pair of old Wranglers. Like the west, these influences have survived the test of time and upheld their sense of lawlessness. For me, the West represents freedom. Free to explore rivers and valleys, ideas and concepts. With wide open skies, there can be no bound on my artistic expression.
Bren Corn Contemporary Expressionist
Bren Corn is a Colorist. She is a Painter specializing in rearranging CB in unique compositions. Her work is featured in Paragon Gallery. Also becoming very known for her poppies as her work is eclectic. Corn also has a studio in Gunnison by appointment only. 103 N Main.
Mary Pat Ettinger Studio
Raised to be an artist, I studied early in oils with an Italian artist before going on to study at Laguna Beach School of Art and Chapman College. In my early 20's I transitioned to painting in acrylics in a watercolor style on specially prepared canvas. It was love at first brushstroke, and I have been pursuing this exhilarating and challenging painting technique ever since that time. My style is distinctive and reflects years of honing my skills. I absolutely love what I get to do every day, and am thrilled to be able to convey to others the excitement and also, the peace, of Colorado on canvas!
Melanie Shaw
Hi! My name is Mel Shaw (She/They). My mission as an artist is to create Art With A Purpose. I was born in Southfield, Michigan, a (mostly) black and Jewish suburb outside of Detroit. I am in Gunnison, because I have a passion for life and living raw. I love nature. My Duality painting represents the balance beam of feeling the alarms of climate change and concurrently experiencing the beauty of life on Earth. The figure coming up in smoke depicts the death of the ego; the Self knowing the unknown. The Self dissipating in Nature. As a young 24 year old latina mixed artist I feel very inspired by Frida Kahlo. My more personal art depicts sexual trauma I’ve experienced, and reconnecting to the body, with acceptance of whatever emotions arise. I’m a passionate artist beginning this long journey and I hope you See my art with curiosity and empathy.
Richard Buchanan
Richard Buchanan (American b. CO 1990, lives in Brooklyn) received a B.A. in Art History in 2013, and an M.F.A. from the New York Academy of Art in 2016. Richard has received numerous awards including the Richard Kubiak Memorial Curatorial Award for curatorial excellence, and the American Austrian Foundation’s Seebacher Prize for Fine Arts. Richard has exhibited in New York, Philadelphia, and Colorado. He continues to show in galleries across the country. Richard’s works can be found in private and public art collections in the United States, and Austria. Email with inquiries.
Seastrum Studio
Born in 1948 in Marshalltown, lowa Don is a master artist and teacher having taught for 45 years in a variety of educational institutions before retiring from Western Colorado University in 2017. As one of the founding members of Vita Institute for the Arts, he has continued presenting workshops designed for those who would like to investigate new directions and/or a more fully developed personal artist practice. Don's work is fundamentally that of a studio-based artist working in acrylic and watercolor painting, and hand-pulled stone lithography. He does use images of human figures, as well as what might more traditionally be called landscapes, however, the human images and landscape forms are not intended to be descriptive of specific individuals or places. Rather they are expressions of ideas in pictorial form. He begins with an idea, a concept, and then presents images and constructed environments rendered with no intent at a naturalistic description. Don's work has been a continuing investigation into the essence and nature of constructed images as individual entities that are neither reliant nor dependent upon a one-to-one reproduction of the subject matter referred to in the work of art. Since copying is not the desired end, it is the process of choosing specific images, values, colors, and patterns of organization that becomes his principal creative concern.
Suzanne Pierson - Water Media Painter
"“It’s not so hard to be happy!” “After amazing days of painting outside or in my Copper Heron River Studio, in Crested Butte, its easy to smile through any storm. I live with Gratitude for every precious day and every rainbow!” SUZANNE PIERSON earned a BFA from Colorado State University & a Masters in Humanities from CU Denver. On several Semester at Sea voyages & traveling throughout her life to nearly 100 countries, she global awareness transfers to her work. A former art & music teacher in Denver, Boulder, & Jeffco public schools, adjunct faculty at CU Boulder, & Metropolitan State University Art Dept., Suzanne enjoys teaching art classes in the Crested Butte at The Center Visual Arts program. * Awarded Excellence in Education by the Colorado Governor Romer Given the Valley Forge Freedom Foundation Award * An internationally awarded composer/playwright and performer Won the United Nations Environment Program “Champion Defender” award for her work with Children’s Musical Theater & her Fine Arts Programs Singer Songwriter professional – 30 years * Author/Illustrator – “Hap the Pup, a Dog’z Guide 4 Kidz” Activity Book & audio CD * Wrote & produced two children’s musicals: “Bodhi and the Rainforest” and “The Bear Summit” musical and “Bear Dreams” children book * Illustrated – “STRANGER TO the WOODS” – authored by Sue Navy to Save the Red Lady for HCCA High Country Conservation Advocates * Red Lady #39 Artists of Crested Butte member Crested Butte Creative District Member * Colorado Watercolor Society/Western Slope Member * Center for the Arts Board member and Visual Arts Faculty"