From the desert terrain of Baja California to the rolling hills and pastures of the Santa Ynez Valley, landscape painter Carrie Givens has made a name for herself depicting areas close to home as well as afar.
“The locations I like to capture are usually places where I live or visit,” the Goleta-based artist told the Sun.
Givens is one of the three featured artists in Three Viewpoints, a new landscape group show at Gallery Los Olivos. The exhibition opens on Thursday, Aug. 1, and also features works by Ellen Yeomans and Morgan Green.
“The three of us each have a different style to our artwork, and we each see the world with different eyes,” said Givens, who primarily works with pastels to create her landscapes, usually of foothills and coastal areas.
“They have a wonderful feel to them and inspiring colors,” she said about pastels. “My work is about color; I like to exaggerate with color just a bit when capturing some of my favorite places.”
Givens relocated to the Central Coast 46 years ago, assuming it was only a temporary move at first, she said. The artist has been exhibiting her works locally with groups such as the Santa Barbara Art Association and the Goleta Art Association since 2004, and is consistently inspired by the lively scenes and atmospheric diversity the area has to offer.
“We are truly blessed to be able to live in this diverse and beautiful area,” Givens said. “And I feel so fortunate to be able to have the passion to work at capturing that beauty.
Like Givens, plein air artist Morgan Green uses pastels to create her naturalistic compositions. Influenced by California impressionists and Western artists of the 19th and 20th centuries, the local pastelist uses realistic colors to emphasize quality and mood of light.
“My landscapes are primarily California. I have found that many people who visit our state really do want to take a piece of it home with them,” Green said. “And California gives us each so many different types of landscapes to paint.”
Green will be the exhibit’s first artist to host a personal reception, on Sunday, Aug. 4, followed by Givens on Sunday, Aug. 18, and Yeomans on Friday, Aug. 23.
“I’ve known Ellen and Carrie for years,” Green said. “Both of them love landscape painting as much as I do, and we all tend to look at the outdoors as home rather than just somewhere out there.”
Givens is also an avid hiker and sailor, and has always considered herself a “lifelong outdoors woman,” she said.
“I tend to seek out the rough ground,” the artist said. “I’m at home up a mountain, at the helm of the sailboat, or hiking in the desert.”
Through her landscapes, Green strives to offer viewers a sensory glimpse into her travels—from both U.S. coasts to Alaska and Puerto Rico. Conveying the feeling of vibrations from ocean waves smashing a cliff, for example, is the goal of one of her beach scenes.
“My aim in art is to give my patrons an escape from the workaday human humdrum with visual poems about the magnificent out there,” Green said. “It’s a challenge I relish. And no matter where I’m opening my sketchbook or setting up my easel, I’m having a good time.”
Like Green and Givens, oil painter Ellen Yeomans is also a lover of the great outdoors. The Santa Barbara-based artist grew up in Southern California, and camped with her family often throughout childhood and early adulthood, which led to her passion for painting outdoors.
“Many things came into focus when I discovered plein air painting,” Yeomans said in the artist statement on her website. “Painting encompasses all of my interests, experiences, loves.”
Also similar to Green, Yeomans hopes her landscapes retain the escapist sense of being there in the moment with her as she’s painting them.
“I strive to make my paintings convey some of the joy, excitement, and peace that I experience in the making of them.”
Arts Editor Caleb Wiseblood loves escapism, piña coladas, and getting caught in the rain. Reach him at cwiseblood@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Aug 1-8, 2019.
