Iris Scott

The world's first professional finger painter.

Iris Scott (b.1984) grew up in Maple Valley, Washington on what she describes as a “one-family hippie commune”. She and her sister spent evenings listening to their mother, a writer, tell epic tales about the anthropomorphized lives of the family’s pet parrots, lizards, cats, goats, and rabbits—with wild coyotes appearing in the stories as special guest stars. Iris’ father, a custom cabinet maker, worked in a shop attached to the house, and Iris absorbed how a woodworker manifests their ideas with their hands. Iris continues the family’s storytelling tradition of magical realism, like her mother, and emulates her father by building the worlds she imagines with her hands.

Scott’s college years were spent in Florence, in the same centuries-old halls where Raphael, Michelangelo, and Da Vinci worked. In her mid twenties Iris moved to a tiny apartment overlooking a rainforest outside of Kaohsiung, Taiwan. There she stumbled upon finger painting when a serendipitous lack of clean brushes prompted her to finish a painting with her fingertips. In that moment she recognized how fingers could scoop oil paint better than brushes, and overnight she committed to leaving her brushes behind. Scot...

2009 Western Governors University, Masters in Teaching, Artistic Development

2006 Washington State University, Bachelor of Fine Arts, Painting

2004 Accademia Italiana, Florence Italy, Bachelor of Fine Arts, Painting

2024 "Let is Gogh" Adelman Fine Art Gallery, San Diego, CA

2021 “Shakin’ Off The Blues” Burnet Fine Art & Filo Sofi Arts, Wayzata, MN

2020 “The Big Wonderful” virtually exhibited by Burnet Fine Art & Filo Sofi Arts, Wayzata, MN

2019 “Ritual in Pairing” Filo Sofi Arts, New York, NY

2018 "The Door's Ajar, Mind the Cat" Solo Show. Filo Sofi Arts, New York, NY

2017 "Blue Spheres" Adelman Fine Art Gallery, San Diego, CA

2015 "Iris Scott" Adelman Fine Art Gallery, San Diego, CA

2015 "Finger Painted" Elements5280 Gallery, Denver, CO

2014 "Iris Scott in New York" Cole Gallery, Edmonds, WA

2014 "Iris Scott" ArtSD, San Diego, CA

2013 "Shakin of the Blues" Horizon Fine Art Gallery, Jackson WY

2013 "Fancy Finger Paintings" Cole Gallery, Edmonds, WA

2012 "Iris Scott" AAFNYC Ugallery, New York NY

2011 "American in Taiwan" Old Gallery, Kaohsiung, Taiwan