MARILEE KRAUSE

IT WAS WHILE LIVING in a studio above an open space in Goleta that Marilee became an avid landscape painter. For five years her view was the wide sky and horizon line. Everyday she would sketch and paint along the paths of More Mesa.

In 2001 she began studying pastel drawing with Glenna Hartmann, learning to put her years of observation down on paper using traditional pastel techniques. These technical skills, combined with her nuanced observations has become the foundation for her more abstract work.
Marilee favors a loose under-painting in watercolor followed by the hand-held immediacy of pastel. For a fresh start, she will rinse off a painting to reveal an imprint of incised pigment and remnants of the under-painting that provide clues for a new direction. For mixed media work she uses gouache, charcoal, and water-soluble oil pastel.

Now working out of a downtown art studio, Krause’s art has absorbed the influence of the urban landscape and the arts community that she is active in. Having moved from an open space to structures and streets, she often searches out nature in the urban; blurring boundaries between abstract and realism.

Krause has won numerous awards for her work as well as grants for teaching and further study, including the Colville grant for 2006.

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