My 13th Art Studio. My first one, at 13, was in a walk-in closet at the family farm. I put in shelves and dragged in a light with the cord under the door. My first drawing was from the book 'Heidi'. About a girl moving to the Alps. And now here I am on my 'mountain top' in Silver City, NM.
Outside my studio french doors on the deck. Resting after working on my terraced on-going 'sculpture'. Strange that I have found and landscaped with rocks at every home I have lived in. I follow natures flow and find the beautiful views. Love the ravens flying overhead, the whoosh of the wings and their chatter, the deer and wildlife peering at me through the fence in back.
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Art Statement
A lifetime of following nature’s path. The shapes and colors layering the surfaces of my art. Those collected objects from the earth, dried plant life and irresistible sticks and stones are replicated and abstracted in the natural bees wax medium. The continuing dialog, the process of translating my story into these materials fills my soul. It does not let me rest, this life spent in our tenuous environment drawing it in and pouring it out in my studio. BIO Diane Kleiss was born in an Iowa Heartland farming community. A BFA in painting, a minor in art history and a K-12 teaching degree were acquired at the University of Minnesota, Duluth. She has taught art in public schools, in her studio, and at several art centers. Her Midwest life was surrounded by, and living from, nature’s bounty and all its inconsistencies. In the following years living in the Northern woods of Minnesota and then the SW desert have continuously kept her walking through nature’s door. After working for many years in oil, acrylic and clay, in 2006 she turned to painting and sculpting with a beeswax medium. A substance harvested from the land, along with the use of nature’s detritus, gives her canvases a clear intent to draw the viewer’s attention to our environment with an accent on the man-made stresses to our eco system. She has exhibited her work is several galleries around the country including solo exhibits, most recently at the Contreras Gallery in Tucson, AZ, March, 2014. Her work has received several awards and was a featured artist in the National Encaustic Art Magazine and in two nationally published encaustic books. She is represented by the SEEDBOAT GALLERY in Silver City, NM www.seedboartgallery.com and the ENCAUSTIC ART INSTITUTE in Cerrillos, NM www.eainm.com In 2013 a move to Silver City, New Mexico is again inspiring and igniting a continuing dialog with nature in a studio on the edge of a cliff where the ravens nest. contact me: d.kleiss@hotmail.com 
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