Burnt Island Lighthouse Oil on Linen Board 9x12

Linda Bail is a painter currently splitting her time between Bucks County, PA and Maine. Her primary approach to painting for the past 10 years has been en plein air, preferably finishing a painting at a single sitting. Often times, those en plein air paintings are taken into the studio to be used as studies or references for larger paintings. This practice couples well with her good fortune to have lived in many parts of the country, including Maine, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Florida, North Carolina, California, and Arizona. Each place has its own rich history of art making and offers a contemporary environment of visual complexity and great beauty. Linda's compositions are inspired by the landscape, including people and object forms and their relationship to the landscape. In Florida, this work revolved around the beaches, canals, and the Everglades. In Maine, the coastal and harbor scenes provide venues. In California, it is the vineyards of Sonoma and Napa counties. In Arizona, it has been the desert, mountains, and the scarce water resources that interplay with this terrain. Each location presents its own exciting compositional challenges, most often trying to decide what to leave out of a composition. Each has very different light, form and color harmonies. To quote one of my teachers, "Producing a painting is combining what you see, with what you know, to express the way you feel". Born in Milo, Maine in 1946, Linda completed a BS in History and Secondary Education from Russell Sage College and a M. Ed. from the University of Maine. An interest in art sprung into the full blown pursuit of becoming an artist through the time honored gateway of the museum. Docent training at the Cincinnati Museum of Art only increased her curiosity about art, its history, its successful, practicing artists and the skills required to make a painting or sculpture. She started the actual journey from audience to practitioner by auditing a drawing class at the Cincinnati Art Academy in 1995 and continued with courses and master artist workshops at the Armory Art Center in West Palm Beach, FL, Braitman Studios in Charlotte, NC, The New York Studio School in Manhattan, and the Scottsdale Artist School in Arizona and the Maine Coast Artist Workshops in Rockland. A pivotal introduction by artist friends to Graham Nickson, the Dean of the New York Studio School deepened her understanding of and commitment to painting. Graham made it clear: "One must draw daily, use the best materials one can afford and, as an oil painter, one must paint at least 100 yards of canvas before you have a clue as to what you are doing!" The serious nature and exhausting challenge of being part of Graham's two week, 12 hour a day drawing and painting marathons has convinced her that the phrase "struggling artist" is first and foremost a reference to the time, knowledge and commitment this endeavor requires. Lindašs paintings are in homes across the country. She has participated in juried shows in Florida, North Carolina, Maine and Arizona. Her first solo show was held in 2010 at the Present Day Club Gallery in Princeton, New Jersey.