My name is Amber and I paint wonder!

I live life with curiosity of people and places, enjoyment of folklore and mythologies and allow them to integrate and meld to ask more thoughtful questions. In my work, those questions take center stage and provoke curiosity. "What if?"

I believe when we lead with curiosity and wonder, we open ourselves to learn more about our communities and environment. And, how to preserve what should be kept and allow change.

It is my mission to bring wonderment and inspire you to ask open ended questions. "What if, I quit the job that makes me feel anxious every Sunday because it all starts again on Monday?" "What if, I say yes to...?" "What if, I say no to...?"What if, I let myself grieve?" What if? 

I believe when we allow for many possible answers, we step into a colorful life. A vibrancy that is worth growing, preserving, and sharing.

 

 

 

 

"Not all those who wander are lost." ― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings. 

Curiosity is everything to help us evolve into people we want to be and preserve the parts of us and memories we value. And I hope that I can bring the most positive wonder to your home.

 

 

Amber's mission is to connect people with their inner truths, and inspire them to make the world a place they want to live with the gifts and unique qualities only they are capable of offering. 

I wanted so badly to be good at the things my sisters were good at. They grew up together, I was separate. I thought that if I did what they did, I could be part of the group. At the age of 8 I started gymnastics. Although it was a bit late to start, I was physically strong from farm work, and naturally flexible, I was put onto a competition team a few months after starting. When I grew a little too tall for a standard gymnast, I took horse riding lessons. I learned to jump fences, and to fall off. I tried running track and playing basketball. Although there were enjoyable moments, they weren't my particular skills. Finally, when I was 14, I started dance lessons. It stuck! I loved performing on stage, even though I was very shy. I was a shy eccentric, wearing wild colored clothes to school, thinking laterally on more creative school assignments, which wasn't always what teachers were looking for. I never considered painting or other fine arts back then. I thought it was fun, but I loved the stage.

When I was a junior in high school, I had a teacher I loathed, and he seemed to hate me. I loved the class subject, history of ancient Greece to the Italian Renaissance. But he belittled and bullied me enough that I finally stopped raising my hand in class. Our final project for the class was to make a rendering of an artwork from the Renaissance with a single page description, or, write a 5 page essay about an artwork. I didn't want to write 5 pages, so I did a charcoal drawing of a self portrait sculpture of Michelangelo. During the break between semesters I went into school to collect my final projects. He was in the classroom when I got there. I asked for my project. He said, "I'm going to keep this as an example. What are you going to do with it, anyway?" I said, "I want my project back. It doesn't matter what I do with it, it's mine." I picked up my picture and as I was about to leave the room to hopefully never walk down the hallway at the same time as him ever again, he stopped me. "Amber, you should be an artist." I snapped back, in a loud voice, "don't tell me what to do!" 

It's a little disappointing when foreshadowing arrives in a detested and unlikely vehicle.

And then I got a passport...

At age 17, I got my first passport, and was the first person in my family to have one - and use it. My first passport stamp was to France my senior year of high school. I started my learning of French in 4th grade summer school, and continued all throughout school. I stayed with a family in Metz, then toured a few places ending in Paris. To this day, I remember more about ordering a sandwich at a cafe in Beaune than what I ate for lunch today. Travel is the most powerful experience to show you who you are when your only task is to simply live.

Since I got that first passport, freedom of exploration has been a priority. I have traveled to France, was a principal dancer in a musical that toured Greece; trained in commedia dell'Arte in Italy; hiked a bit of the Black Forest in Germany; rode a horse around the pyramids in Egypt; navigated through the Grand Bazaar in Turkey; swam with blacktip sharks in French Polynesia; went volcano boarding in Nicaragua; performed a one-woman play in Northern Ireland; wandered Edinburgh during the fringe festival; got my yoga teacher certification in Costa Rica; lived in Windsor and was a bartender in a pub in Eton, England; was a showgirl at a resort in Mexico; and my favorite, and most impactful living and travel experience was Ireland.

I went to college in Dublin, Ireland at the Gaiety School of Acting. To this day, I have life long friends and chosen family there. Ireland epitomizes for me the 'best of times, and worst of times.' 

When everything changed, and my world went dark

​In 2006 everything - life, passion, sobriety - was over. My best... person, committed suicide and with the loss of him I stopped all artistic pursuits - and everything else in life. I worked in an office, and all the acting I was capable of was for 8 hours a day. I was exhausted all the time, and felt rage when someone asked me how I was doing. "I was fine until you asked, now I'm reminded why life isn't worth it." After several months of isolation and only sleeping because I hoped to dream, and many bottles of wine... I decided to try living again. Travel was my first step to remembering who I was, and why living is worth while. I got my passport out and traveled to Egypt, where my only task was to simply live. 

I am passionate about suicide prevention, with hopes that I can prevent as many people as possible from becoming suicide survivors - or at least help them feel they're not alone.

 

"The Man, The Legend"
NFS
This is Wayne. Before his passing, he saw this painting, in the current state it's in - which was unfinished. He said how much he liked it just as it was, and not long after that, he died. This painting was left finished in its unfinished state, just like the life of its subject.

Then Came A Time That Changed Everyone's World 

The 2020 Pandemic

The years leading up to the covid pandemic I had worked as a dancer and actress at several theatre companies in Chicago and had moved back to Minnesota in 2016, where I worked with more theatre companies. I sometimes painted stage backdrops - only because I was capable, not because I considered myself a painter. If I was in a play that needed one I said I could do it.

Then in 2020, during the first lockdown, I started painting regularly, like a painter would. To my surprise, I was asked to do two unsolicited commissions. People wanted my work on their walls? After I completed them, I was curious to learn how to create paintings that weren't toxic to me and the environment. I started making oil paint, which I had never before used. I loved it! Something else that stuck! There's a calm in the richness of natural pigments, that is just different, at least to me, in how truthful the colors are. Some are difficult to work with, some easy, some thin, some more grainy... but they all create a whole of a picture once on the canvas. I use walnut oil to mix with my natural pigments, and a soy-based solvent. 

The first full oil painting I made was an image of someone else's travel experience. An Australian friend traveled in Iran, and through Instagram, became friends with the shepherd in the picture. People are awesome when we let them be.

 

 

Shepherd
30"x20" raw pigment oil on canvas

 

 

 

 

Taking a risk

In 2021, I moved my art into a shared studio gallery space in the Northrup King Building in Minneapolis. It's an art complex with more than 400 artists under one roof, and home to the country's largest indoor open studio event, Art-A-Whirl.  

What if, I make the choice of an
artful life?