This month we’re featuring Louise Holland for the Capitol Hill Art League’s Mind of the Artist feature. Read her story and check out her beautiful artwork below. Follow Louise on Instagram at @louiseindc and find her artwork at Louiseindc.webador.com

I grew up in a creative home in 1960s and 1970s England. My mother had been a London theater designer and, with their notoriously small budgets, was probably the first recycler! Everything was repurposed,  she looked at their shapes, their textures, all could become part of a creative piece of work for stage or event design.

I knew I had a creativity, but always questioned my technical ability. After 4 years at art school, I still struggled to draw and so majored in photography, but it was rarely more than a hobby in the years that followed. Fast forward half a lifetime in real estate, now retired and I’m once again having time to make art inspired by the world around me. 

I’m still a photographer at heart, with infinite patience waiting for a storm to arrive, or trying to revisit a familiar scene by taking a photo from an unusual angle. I’m not a great one for Photoshop,  there’s so much work done by others out there that although very beautiful, doesn’t have an honesty of interpretation that I can relate to. But I will fine tune brightness, contrast and color intensity to reproduce what I see in my mind. My world is vibrant with color!

I’m exploring watercolor painting as well these days and was thrilled to have a painting selected for the juried Galaxy show. I have returned to the UK this summer and look forward to seeing more inspirational places to photograph and paint.