Laureen Weaver
Artist
My art career didn’t get started until 2009 when I actually had time to do something other than work. My first art trip was with an art group to the south of France, which was life-changing. After returning, I spent every available opportunity improving my art whenever time permitted. My work focused in acrylic and oil mediums primarily landscapes and contemporary themes.
New home builders approached me to paint their communities - making my art pieces into coasters, prints and other items for closing buyer gift baskets. I also painted vineyards, wine tasting barns and hotels for the wine country - transposing art to wine labels, coasters and trivets sold in wine tasting rooms. My greatest hit was weekend art shows held in vacant listings to attract open house visitors for “Art, Wine and Real Estate” events when I lived in San Diego, California. It was very different real estate marketing but it worked extremely well. Now living full-time in Sheridan, Wyoming I am back doing both art and real estate and you can check out my artist site at LaureenWeaverArtist.com and real estate at LiveSheridanWyoming.
Giving back to the community is important for me; I donate many art pieces to local charities for silent auctions yearly as well work on the Marketing at SAGE Community Art, The Brinton Museum landscape committee and redesigning Sheridan Public Arts website in 2021.
I am very honored to be in the 2022 Wyoming Governors Art Exhibition at the Wyoming State Museum in Cheyenne, Wyoming Feb thru Aug, 2022
Born and raised in Alberta, Canada on a prairie farm from a family of nine, I loved to sit for hours watching rainstorms, bright summer sunsets, and cloud formations. In my mid-twenties, I moved to southern California drawn by the weather - first to southern California in San Diego, then later to northern California in Carmel-by-the-sea. I discovered Wyoming on a 2019 Road Trip - instantly fell in love and moved. Wyoming reminded me of my home in Alberta in so many ways: endless skies, bright sunrises and sunsets coupled with enormous, dramatic thunderclouds.
My favorite part of the mornings is taking long nature walks, where I snap endless photos of color combinations of plants, animals, and the sky - this is where a lot of my artistic inspiration comes from. To get the rich techniques in my paintings, I use a “broken brush” which is a beat-up brush that probably should be thrown away but instead gives the greatest effects to my work. Other favorite tools are spatulas, boards, squeegees, and palette knives which generate different effects. Lately, I have started using just my fingers or palm of my hand. My large pieces are abstract, bold and impressionistic.
They say a picture captures a thousand words; a painting can do that and more. Some of my favorite artist quotes that guide me when I am stuck:
“It doesn’t matter how the paint is put on, as long as something is said.”
-Jackson Pollack
"If you hear a voice within you say 'you cannot paint,' then by all means paint, and that voice will be silenced."
-Vincent Van Gogh.
“There is no such thing as a good painting about nothing.”
-Mark Rothko
“I am so lucky to be where I am and to be who I am” -Neltje