Betty Pethel Art
Artist Bio
As a Fine Arts major at the University of Arizona in Tucson, I continued studies in New Jersey and at Maryland Hall, St. John's College and the Anne Arundel Community College. Also invaluable has been a personal pursuit of studying the lives and art of world famous artists and museum visits.
When personally painting, there is no one particular style, or favored subject matter or surface material. The determining factor is how I can best portray the subject. What subject am I seeing or internalizing emotionally and wishing to portray its Mood, Form, Color, and Design. Clarifying that is what makes Art very challenging, sometimes defeating, and even exciting as all these thoughts gestate and life is given to a new work.
Sculpted Wall Art Embellishments
These embellished carved ornaments originally came from France and England, dating back to the 1700s and early 1800s before coming here. The decoration of my walls with these carved pieces was an ambitious project that took over a year to complete: beginning with finding the source, laying out precise sizing of each piece and then making it into the desired decorative motif. The embellishments were applied on select plywood and then painted. All of this took place on sawhorses in my garage.
About the Paintings
The works span diverse subjects in both thought and scope. The paintings, poems, and writings seek to explore “the soul of Man,” as reflected in the Hagar painting and accompanying poem, in the short story In the Forest of the Deep, and in other related works.
Many paintings capture the poignancy of “a happening”—moments suspended in time—such as those found in the colorful and dynamic settings of the Merry Go Round and Umbrella series. Others depict a fragile stillness, a memory, a quiet surface beauty that may soon shift or erupt into the unexpected, as explored in the Abstract series.
These are unfolding scenes of life—an exploration of themes and characters. Each work is painted not only for the artist, but for the viewer to ponder. Beneath color, movement, and composition lies an invitation to ask the enduring question: Why?