Meet Laurie Svec: Mixed Media Artist.

Laurie’s interest in art started early in life.  It was the inspiration and encouragement of a special teacher that got her started on her artistic path.

“My interest in art started with my 7th grade art teacher. Norma Lachelle is still living in Corvallis and is 91 yrs old.  She inspired me with her enthusiasm and joy for art, plus my parents put me into some private art classes that I enjoyed. Basically - I found out that I really enjoyed paints of all kinds, papers, colors, getting messy, and creating something unique that has never been created before and only mine.” 

Creating gives Laurie a chance to bring her soul and her spirit of adventure to life.

“My favorite part of my processes to create my art is the excitement of trying new materials and techniques. Also with watercolor painting, I need to have a subject that is very soul touching, otherwise I lose the thrill of the process.” 

Inspiration pops up everywhere for Laurie.

“I cannot help but be intrigued by patterns, colors, shapes. and textures. I get interesting ideas that pop into my mind or I see art and/or craft work that excite me and I want to try to replicate it somehow or make it work in my own style and use it in my own work somehow.” 

Invention is another inspiration to Laurie.  Though we may see eggs as food, Laurie sees them and other non-traditional materials as art media.

“I have been working with egg shells for over 40 years. Painting and decorating egg shells, and cut out shadow box style Christmas ornaments. I have used ostrich, rhea, emu, goose, duck, turkey, chicken, pigeon, dove, quail, cockateel, and finch eggs. Recently I have experimented with egg shell mosaics. I have an ongoing commission with the Japanese Gardens where you can find my Japanese paper wrapped eggs for sale in the gift shop.”

I use Tyvek building material and paint it with metallic acrylics and then heat it to form interesting 3D sculptures that I can put into shadow boxes. I saw a tutorial online about how to do this and it was fun to work with.

I have invented my own evaporative abstract technique using indelible inks and Yupo paper which is slick plastic paper. This technique originated from a solar watercolor technique I learned about through an article in the Oregonian many years ago. I played with different papers and different paints/inks, and came up with my own idea. I still use both techniques and enjoy the magic that happens after the paints and inks dry.” 

Here’s some of what you’ll see at Laurie’s studio during the Washington County Open Studios Tour, October 18-19 from 11am-5pm.

 “Art studio visitors will likely see me working on Japanese paper wrapped egg shells. I hope to have some eggs at different stages of the process available to see. I will try to have an evaporative ink painting in progress too - under a gooseneck lamp to warm the ink and water. The Brownian Movement helps to evaporate the color onto the paper in unusual ways.”

You can see more of Laurie’s work and visit her studio during Washington County Open Studios tour October 18-19^th from 11am to 5pm.  And on her website at www.villagegalleryarts.org/laurie-svec