Westhampton Break Painting

A native New Yorker, Emily Baker studied Studio Art at Middlebury College and has since built an extensive portfolio of watercolors and oil paintings. Emily is often inspired by beauty found in nature; her work in oils captures the subtle details of natural landscapes—a dramatic sunset, low-laying clouds or a solitary tree — while incorporating elements of the modern world. Her more recent pieces are inspired by water. Growing up spending half the time at her family’s home in Shelter Island, she has always been drawn to the sea. These paintings focus on water’s movement and include both vast seascapes as well as zoomed in, textural pieces. Emily pays particular attention to the framing of her images, so that the subject matter becomes less important than the viewer’s angle and the light in which it is composed. “When I’m choosing an image to paint, I don’t strive for photo realism,” she explains. “I’m more interested in capturing the feeling that inspired me in the first place, whether it’s the darkness of an oncoming storm or just the possibility of the open road.” As a result, her paintings feel at once intimate and vast, and often explore the concepts of discovery and contemplation—how a person can be so affected by their surroundings that they are forced to stop and absorb the moment. She is regularly commissioned by private collectors and her work has been shown in galleries in California, Florida, Virginia, Connecticut, Vermont, New Jersey, New York and Eastern Long Island. She lives and works in Cascais, Portugal.