PROFILE

Carolyn Wolf Russell is an emerging artist who resides in Vista, California. She grew up in a small mid-western town, learning to love art by coloring at the coffee table with her older brother. As she grew older, she continued exploring artistic mediums through her high school teachers and classes, learning jewelry making and oil painting. After graduating from high school there never seemed to be the opportunity to engage in an education in art. But that did not stop the need to be creative and so Carolyn turned to the world of observation as her teacher. She read anything she could get her hands on and enjoyed meeting other artists. And of course she 'practiced'.
"You have to not be afraid to make mistakes" she says. "if you don't like it, paint over it or throw it away. But if you don't try something you'll never know what it feels like to express it." She has experimented with several mediums, airbrushing murals on walls and T-shirts, and oil painting. But Carolyn has always returned to her medium of choice, Acrylics.
Carolyn has traveled the country extensively and spent time in some of the most beautiful areas imaginable. She loves enjoying nature, and photographs as much as she can to record her trips. These have been the basis of most of her sea and landscape paintings. "A photograph just never seems to instill the emotions of a place I have actually been. So when I paint it I can get that feeling back and that is what I try to express in the art. I wish for the observer to want to run in the grass or leave their footprints on that road."
Of late, Carolyn's subject matter has turned to wildlife. She has been able to expand her love of nature to encompass the landscape and the animals that impact it. Her wildlife paintings evoke the attitude and emotions of the animals and their behavior in their environment.
In 2000 Carolyn moved to Vista, CA and finally began to search for venues to exhibit and market her art. She is one of the founding members of the Vista Art Association Foundation and has been the Director of the Vista Village Art Gallery since April of 2004. You can also see her work publicly at Ciao Italian Restaurant in Vista, and at the Creek Walk Art Show in Vista.