Denise Mortensen

I didn’t make art for 40 years. Then I picked up a paintbrush in my fifties and my journey began.

During those 40 years. I created and nurtured my five best works of art: my children. Along the way, I published four children’s books, inspired young minds as a teacher, and crafted words as an editor.

Growing up in a suburb of New York City, I was the third of seven children. Our house was a happy, boisterous place—where all manner of stray animals, people and children gravitated—and where I first found my love for drawing and painting.

Art was my favorite subject in high school, but after graduation, I went off to college to study journalism, then worked in New York City for CBS News and the Condé Nast Publications. Later, I married my high-school sweetheart and this crazy thing called life happened: kids, college, work, and two long-distance moves, which put me on autopilot for many years. In 2018, when my house was suddenly quiet, I began creating art again. I picked up where I left off 40 years ago, first drawing graphite portraits and re-acquainting myself with watercolors, then moving into acrylics and mixed media.

I’ve spent the past several years re-immersing myself in art theory and practice, having completed the 12-wee...

B.A., Journalism, St. Bonaventure University

Group Exhibitions:
2019 Artists on the Bluff Exhibition, Lake Forest, IL/The Gallery
2024 Shape & Form, Sturt Haaga Gallery, Flintridge, CA
(Jurors: Meher McArthur, art historian and curator,
Los Angeles, CA; and Mollie White, Gallerist,
Mollie White Gallery, Los Angeles, CA)
2024 Far & Wide, Woodstock Artists & Art Museum, Woodstock, NY
(Juror: Jane Eckert, Founding Director of Eckert Fine Art, Washington Depot, CT)
2024 Call Me When You Get Over the Bridge, Cultural Center of Cape Cod, Cape Cod, MA
2024 Northern National Art Exhibition, Nicolet College Art Gallery, Rhinelander, WI
(Juror: Debra Brehmer, owner/director Portrait Society Gallery, Milwaukee, WI)
2024 Fall Exhibition, Art League of the Chathams, Chatham, NJ
2024 Art League of Rhode Island, jurors, Joshua Cullion and Adria Polletta