Red Bird Painting

LAURA STOKES, CONTEMPORARY ARTIST Laura Stokes is a retired Architectural Engineer with an educational background in visual art. She has actively pursued consistent production of her studio art since 2012. Her oeuvre currently includes neo-abstraction and neo-surrealism, and she developed competency in figurative and realistic imagery prior to pursuing her current body of work. She has shown her work publicly since 2012 in the Pacific Northwest and in California. Her background in art education includes two semesters of art history at Modesto Junior College, one year of fine art instruction, Texas Tech University, and one year of architectural design and drafting, Texas Tech University. She is from a family of artists, having two sisters with BFA’s, one of which also practiced architecture. The primary artists she has trained under include Juan Rodriguez, BFA University of Washington and Jim Abuan, MFA Otis Art Institute of LA County. She also studied in northern Virginia with John Smith, an ink and watercolor artist, trained in Europe prior to WWII, who made his living solely through producing, selling and teaching art. She dedicates time visiting MOMA museums in large cities; visits gallery websites and brick and mortar establishments in Sacramento, Los Angeles, and San Francisco; follows the work of Julie Mehretu, Kerry James Marshall, Yayoi Kusama, Ai Wei Wei and others. She is influenced by the works of Frank Stella, Helen Frankenthaller, Nathan Olivera and many other historical 20th century artists. She stays current with the art world issues by reviewing articles by Artnet and similar sites, Jerry Saltz, the New Yorker magazine and the New York Times. She began showing her work publicly in the Puget Sound region in Washington 2012-2014 in local businesses and galleries, including the Bluewater Gallery, Poulsbo, WA and her own open studio gallery in downtown Bremerton. Nana’s in Anchorage, Alaska showed her work in 2013-2014. Her work was shown 2016 in City Hall, Seattle as part of a touring show with other artists: https://www.seattle.gov/arts/real-change-agents-portrait-project http://artbeat.seattle.gov/2016/02/29/real-change-portrait-project-on-view-at-the-seattle-city-hall-gallery/ . In California, she has shown in group shows at the Chartreuse Muse Gallery, Modesto and the School Street Gallery, Lodi. Her work was featured in the School Street Galley in a solo show in 2016.