WAOW Artistry of the West

The WAOW Artistry is slowly being built to provide a page on our site to promote each artist* You can search by name, location or by subject matter to find an artist.

*Artist Source Acknowledgment: Content on these pages is shared with permission and is sourced from the featured member artist’s website and professional biography. All rights remain with the artist.

Laurie Harrower • Utah • waow

I paint daily and my medium is oil. Sometimes I use cold wax for my abstracts. I also use oil sticks for some added line work.  I am inspired by so much beauty around me that I can’t be in a "pigeon hole” so I go with my "intuition in the moment" in my studio. I live in Ogden Utah.  I use my photos from my adventures out and about so all paintings are done in studio.  I have ' essential tremor' and paint with two hands;  we all have something to overcome in pursuing the love of life,  some more than others. “

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Ilona Benzak • Florida • waow

“Art has always been an intricate part of my life. I feel that a successful work of art is a combination of creative vision and the integrity of the subject matter. To me this makes for a finished and honorable painting... job well done.” 

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Alison Crary • Arizona • waow

I find myself constantly inspired by light, color, and the sense of atmosphere found in western landscapes- from grand vistas to simple scenes with interesting light. My goal is not strict realism but rather to convey the 'feel' of a particular place and time; I want to share the sense of excitement with you that made me want to paint that scene in the first place!

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Karen Wadsworth • California • waow

I'm a Southern California artist who has returned to an early love called painting. I have a BFA in Illustration from CSULB and worked in a corporate art department before taking time off to raise a family.  I picked my brushes up again during the COVID epidemic, and am now happily wrestling with the challenges and pleasures of painting on location (aka “en plein air”) and in my studio.  

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Doris Hubbell • Colorado • waow

After moving to Colorado 30 years ago from Switzerland, Doris Hubbell finally found time to discover oil painting. Her western lifestyle here in Colorado on their horse & hay ranch with beautiful Labrador Retrievers inspired her to explore her artistic expression. “I enjoy expressing my love for all of them through my art!”

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Regina Free • Oklahoma • waow

"I am an interdisciplinary artist who prides myself as a wife and mother of three amazing children. I set art aside for twenty years to enjoy the fleeting moments of their childhood. Now that the time is right I am building my portfolio and exploring new mediums." Regina Free

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Sascha Ripps • Colorado • waow

Sascha Ripps is a contemporary realist painter of landscapes, wildlife, botanical and floral themes.  She works in oil on panel with the goal of capturing the intensity of light, color, texture and the energy she feels from her subjects.  She blends elements of realism with abstraction, especially when zooming in on textures in her work.

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Karen Storm • Colorado • waow

Karen Storm is a contemporary oil painter known for landscape and nature paintings created en plein air and in her studio.  Her style is a combination of representational and impressionist influences with which she focuses on her emotional connection to nature through her expression of light, color and atmosphere.    

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Margi Tucker • Arkansas • waow

Margi Tucker is a contemporary pastel artist known for her nature-inspired artworks.  Her work often blends detailed realism with symbolic or spiritual narrative in her quest to capture the essence or spirit of her subject and its surroundings.  Her drive is to preserve the species or scene in her art, as such may not exist in years to come. 

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Betsy Johnson Welty • Colorado • waow

Betsy Johnson Welty is a contemporary American oil painter best known for her vibrant, expressive landscapes, cityscapes, and floral compositions featuring bold colors and loose brushwork that blend realism, impressionist elements and graphic design sensibilities.  She regards the act of creating art as a process of continued discovery that brings with it challenges, surprises, obstacles, insight and epiphanies. Each new painting presents a new set of adventures and a quest for interpreting the world she sees in a unique way.

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Pam Holnback • Colorado • waow

Pam Holnback creates contemporary impressionist oil paintings.  She finds inspiration in nature, her travels, and in her home and garden.  Each painting is done with loose, spontaneous brushwork that expresses the light and color that she sees.  The principles of art and elements of design are basic in the initial drawing and development of each painting.  She produces artworks both en plein air and in her studio.

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Shirley Hove • Texas • waow

Shirley Hove is a contemporary visual artist working in oils, watercolor and pastel.  She works primarily from life, whether the subject is landscape, portrait, or still life, to express the subtleties of color and shape created by light.  She strives for a direct response to her subject with the object of capturing selective beauty and emotion through expressive, soft simplification that builds conceptual depth to her subjects.

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Sasha Phillips • Pennsylvania • waow

Sasha Phillips integrates three fields of professional endeavor.  She is a high–level corporate lawyer, a professional artist, and developer of mental health through art wellness programs.  Phillips is an oil painter.  Her art focuses on visual storytelling, often tied to mental or emotional processing of trauma and social issues.

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Sandhyaa Shetty • Texas • waow

Sandhyaa Shetty is a fine artist specializing in landscape paintings executed in oils and acrylics.  She works in the traditions of the impressionist and plein air genres.  Her earliest works reflected the beauty of rural India as she experienced it at her grandparents’ farm.  She sought to paint the interaction of divine nature and emotional connection to the land with the intent to freeze it upon her canvas to preserve it forever.  When her marriage brought her to the United States, the beautiful landscapes and people in her new home continue to inspire her work.

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Judy Buckner • Texas • waow

Judy Buckner paints her deep connection to the Southwest, fueled by family time spent in New Mexico, Arizona, California and Colorado, where she draws inspiration for her oil paintings from the people and landscapes. She is also a mural painter, whose work is displayed at Dallas Fort Worth and Love Field airports in Texas, in addition to several restaurants in the area.

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Karen Nicolaij Glancy • California • waow

Karen Nicolaij Glancy is a California-based painter specializing in atmospheric landscapes, coastal scenes and ocean views, still life and floral paintings.  She is inspired by the natural light and open environments of the American west and coastal California.  She works primarily in pastels, acrylics and oils.

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Carol Devereaux • Texas • waow

Carol Devereaux is a landscape and figurative artist working in Dallas, Texas.  Devereaux’s loose, painterly artworks reflect her interest in natural light and the visual patterns that define form. She enjoys working en plein air to create her landscape scenes; or from life when doing figurative work.  Her work is also informed by her travel experiences that she explores in her studio work.  Oil and pastel are her primary mediums.

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Joy Gonzalez • California • waow

I have always loved the creative process, currently including painting in oils, pastels and watercolor.  In my artwork, I try to convey my deep appreciation of the natural world. I hope my paintings share the excitement I feel outdoors and the exuberance of creative activity.

On my best painting days, I lose track of time and get into the flow of what I am doing, then look up and discover that I have been painting all day.  My favorite subjects are landscapes, often small paintings painted plein air or larger paintings painted from my plein air studies. I love the richness and depth of oil on canvas and I also love the fluidity and delicacy of watercolor on paper. I have recently added pastels to my repertoire and I'm becoming comfortable with them.

If I can give the viewer a magical view of a special place and time of day, my art has fulfilled its purpose. Joy Gonzalez

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Patricia Ridge Bradley • Oklahoma • waow

Patricia Ridge Bradley is a representational fine artist known for her work in charcoal, pastel, oil, and acrylic.  She produces portraits, figures, still life, landscapes, streetscapes, and Western-themed subjects that range from loose, spontaneous expression to meticulously detailed renderings.

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