Exhibit June 2-July 18
Reception and Informal Artists’ Talk: Sunday, June 13, 2-4 p.m.

Diane Sandlin’s paintings, filled with lines, gestures and judicious color, offer a slice-of-life glimpse of a woman who celebrates life as a journey. Freedom. Energy. Palimpsest. Quiet beauty of the ordinary. These expressions are all evident in her abstract paintings. Full of twists and turns, her life path informs her artistic practice and describes her own unique expression.

Like the pieces she paints, Diane’s personal history has meandered from a creative childhood in a small Texas town to a residence in picturesque Rhineland Germany, a degree from UT-Austin and then on to a corporate career centered in Dallas and San Francisco where she specialized in risk management insurance solutions for large multi-national corporations.

Returning to Austin, Diane became immersed in the art world first with textiles by making whole cloth designs using dyes and fabric manipulation techniques. Textiles evolved into mixed media paintings while she benefitted from robust self-directed art studies involving exceptional teachers and mentors. For Diane, painting is a way of communicating visually. She creates art that lays the groundwork for stories to be told. Ordinary experiences such as wind swaying tall grasses, the sheer magnitude of the night sky, graceful interactions between people captivate her imagination. She paints intuitively with minimal pre-intent and depicts what is felt and unseen – such as the sensation of dusk, not just the way it looks but a visceral reaction to the experience. With art as the catalyst, her hope is for the viewer to pause, observe, discover and be transported.

Education
*University of Texas at Austin, BA, 1975
*Art Cloth Mastery Program with Jane Dunnewold, 2010-2012, Art Cloth Studios, San Antonio, TX
*Art2Life Creative Visionary Path Program with Nicholas Wilton, Sausalito, CA, 2017 and 2018
*Mentoring with Pamela Caughey, contemporary artist, Hamilton, MT, 2018
*The Artist Mindset program, Cheryl Taves, Vancouver, British Columbia, 2019
*Various workshops with Lauren Mantecon, Santa Fe artist, 2018 – present and current invitational Deep Dive program
*The Language of Color, Mark and Marija Eanes, Bay Area, CA, 2020
*Mentoring with Cheryl Taves – ongoing
*Critical Discussion Group with Bill Porteous and Cheryl Taves, 2020–present

Learn more about Diane Sandlin at her website, dianesandlinstudios.com.