Renée Kelleher’s journey as an artist took off when she started painting murals at her elementary school. Then, in junior high, an art teacher saw potential and encouraged her to attend the California College of Arts and Crafts one summer.
“My teachers were all French, and it was live nude models. Our parents had to sign a waiver that it’s OK to look at naked bodies,” she said with a laugh.
The experience boosted her confidence as a young artist, she remembered, because she was holding her own amid painters from around the world.
See their POV
Gallery Los Olivos is open daily from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and is located at 2920 Grand Ave. in Los Olivos. The featured artist show, A Personal Point of View, is up through the end of October.
Elsewhere, Carrie Givens and Karen McGaw were also developing a love for art at a young age.
Like Kelleher, Givens remembered an inspiring art teacher who influenced her life. She drew all throughout school, experimenting with different media, until she landed on pastels. She took a break to raise her family but found her way back.
“I always wanted to be an artist and didn’t think it would really happen,” Givens said. “But now I feel like maybe I might be.”
McGaw became a dental hygienist after her parents steered her away from art school, “as was real common in that time,” she said, but the passion stuck with her. McGaw hung her work in the dental office, which led to her first sales.
Despite the twists and turns of life, they all made time to pursue painting. Now the three have been friends for years, evident in their banter on a recent group phone call with the Sun.
Their exhibit, A Personal Point of View, is up at Gallery Los Olivos through the end of October. It marks their first show all together and features watercolors by McGaw, pastels by Givens, and oils by Kelleher.
McGaw and Kelleher first met in the 1990s through a watercolor critique group.
“We became best friends and fellow painters, and we took that trip to France and had so much fun,” McGaw said. “We’ve been doing things like that ever since.”
The pair encountered Givens about eight years ago in a critique group, Brush Marks, and the trio solidified. Brush Marks has been a strong foundation for their friendship through the years.
“We’re still friends, even after critiques,” Kelleher said.
At monthly Brush Marks meetings, 11 artists convene for drinks and snacks. They give advice to each other about how to elevate their work and grow as artists.
The trio thinks that their regular honest and caring feedback led to their lasting friendship. They don’t agree with every critique, but everyone is allowed their own point of view. That perspective inspired the name of their show.
“We’re tight as artists, as critics, and yet nobody has ever said, ‘I have to change the way I paint,’” Kelleher said. “We all come to it from our own perspective. It’s been really cool, so I love this title.”
In A Personal Point of View, McGaw’s work emphasizes water and light on the cliffs, prominent in her landscapes. One of her favorites is an evening scene at Leadbetter Beach in Santa Barbara.
“With watercolor, you never know if you’re going to get it or not, and every once in a while, you get lucky,” McGaw said. “That one all kind of went together for me.”
Leadbetter Evening depicts the Santa Barbara cliffs bathed in warm sunlight above the shallow, glistening tide.
Givens will also be showing some of her landscape paintings, but her focus is on still life vegetables and fruit. She and her husband have an organic farm in Goleta where Givens likes to photograph produce in the fields. She’s returning to the subject after having lost some of her previous vegetable paintings in a fire.
“I just really have fun with the leaves, trying to arrange the leaves so that they look kind of decorative,” Givens said.
“I can’t wait to see those, Carrie,” Kelleher chimed in.
Kelleher is displaying “a bit of this and that,” including a few pieces from her succulent series and a New York scene of a flower market that her two friends suggested she include.
“Thank you, girls,” Kelleher said to her friends. “That’s what friends are for.”
The artists agreed that it’s a validating feeling to have their paintings hang in the gallery. They each work at the gallery one day per month, which is especially fun when they have artwork up because they can see gallerygoers’ reactions.
“It’s like the completed circle,” McGaw added, “from the seed of imagination to the full circle.”
Reach Staff Writer Madison White at mwhite@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Oct 2 – Oct 9, 2025.