Painting ‘en plein air’ is very active and challenging. This type of painting, involves taking a travel easel outdoors and painting from life. It is traditional to paint landscapes, but Amanda also enjoys painting small still-life studies outside. The artist usually works within a small window of time (2-3 hours). Lighting changes fast, so getting down her initial impressions is what is most important in her work.

“I love the feeling of waking up in the morning and going out to paint. I grab my coffee, pack my car, and have my destination in mind. Nothing is as exhilarating as thinking of all the possibilities of painting that day.” - Amanda

During the Winter months, when it is too cold to paint outside, Amanda works inside her home studio and focuses on painting stillife. Her studies are a great way to take the time to really see color relationships and form.

“I love getting lost in a painting. That feeling when the world narrows and you are truly in the moment, only thinking of putting one color next to the last, trying to describe something in the loosest of terms- an impression of what you see. I get lost in furiously mixing on my palette, chasing light as it moves across a scene. I just focus on articulating visual thoughts as they occur to me, one after the other.” -Amanda

Painting landscapes is always a challenging and exciting endeavor. Amanda often paints from life, on location ‘en plein air’.

“The decisions that are made have to be efficient and exact. At times the weather does not cooperate, but it contributes to the challenge. There is a very rustic and adventurous feeling about the experience of painting outdoors. It is one of the most freeing things about painting; to venture outside, find a great location, and translate a vast three dimensional experience onto a two dimensional surface. “

When she needs to gain momentum to start a big project, Amanda will often do small studies to get her ideas moving. Small designs or palette knife studies help her to investigate what she wants to achieve from a bigger painting.

Amanda often chooses simple objects that get her excited about color. She is a big proponent of painting everyday objects or scenes and trying to make them look at beautiful as possible.

“Paint something that isn’t anything until it is painted well.”

- Charles Hawthorne

Amanda tries to include figure drawing and painting into her studio practice regularly. She paints and sketches from live models to help see shape and form and always enjoys the challenge of trying to get a likeness.

Over the past few years Amanda has become increasingly interested in 2-D design and is self-taught on Adobe Photoshop & Illustrator.

Amanda was head of Marketing & Publicity for Artists’ Gallery in Ellicott City from 2022-2024. She designed the artist collective logo and was apart of the team to launch the rebranding of the gallery 2022. Amanda was also in charge of the social media for the gallery from Sept. 2021-Nov. 2023. She currently makes most of the 2D design for print and digital applications for the gallery.

Amanda also occasionally works with paper collage and fabric to make colorful designs.