606 Casey Key Rd

Nokomis, FL 34275

941.488.1177

Bttya55@comcast.net

"Casey Key Garden" - 26x30  Mixed Media

Betty’s career as an artist began as an oil painter at the Art Institute of Chicago.  She opted for realism-figurative portraiture and still life.  However, when she moved to Florida after raising her 4 children in Chicago, her horizons surprisingly expanded.  Her media proficiency was enlarged to include acrylic, watercolor, collage and mono-printing.  There was a new depth and a more abstract and impressionistic look to her work. 

 Today, exciting images from her frequent travels around the world appear in her paintings, including her travels to France, Morocco, Portugal, Wales, Ireland, Italy, Spain, Scotland, and Denmark.  Her credo continues as always to be “to stir the mind, to stimulate the imagination and to pull the viewer into the painting”.  Hers is a world of color, mesmerized by the awesome forces of nature, the sunsets, storms, and ever-changing water world of the Gulf of Mexico, adjoining her home.  Betty has received top state, national and international honors and ribbons for her work which has been exhibited around the world.  Some of her favorite exhibitions would include: Paris, France, CENTRE INTERNATIONAL de L’ART CONTEMPORAIN; Washington DC the SUMNER MUSEUM; New York City at the CORK GALLERY in the Lincoln Center, VENICE VISIONARIES, Venice Florida, Art Uptown, Sarasota & Art Center, Sarasota.

BACKGROUND:

Betty was married is1939. Her husband was in Government Service and they lived in Chicago

Betty raised four children, three sons and one daughter.

In 1975 she moved to Florida

and is a resident of Nokomis.

EDUCATION:

B.A. Degree, Cum Laude,

University of Rochester, New York

Graduate work, French

Merrill-Palmer, Detroit, Michigan

Taught French in Junior & High Schools in Chicago & Highland Park.

ART EDUCATION:

Art Institute of Chicago

Chicago:  Private instruction with: Sidney Rafilson, Hilda Rubin, & John Cadel

Florida:   Workshops with: Robert Osborne, Leon Berkowitz, Morris Shubin, Barbara Nechis, Charles Reid, & Leona Sherwood

PROFESSIONAL ACTIVITIES:

1981-1987  Art Director & Fund Raising Exhibit Chairwoman for Glen Gallery Boys’ Club, Sarasota

1984-present:  Awards Chairman & Art Awards Chairman

1996-2000:     President National League of American Pen Women

2000-2002:     Vice-President of National League of American Pen Women

MEMBERSHIP IN:

Phi Beta Kappa, Longboat Key Art Association, Art League of Manatee, Sarasota Art Center, Sarasota Arts Council, Women Contemporary Artists, Women’s Museum of Art in Washington, DC, Venice art Center, Florida Artists’ Group III

AWARDS:

One-Person Exhibits:  Glen Gallery (Boys’ Club), Unity Church, Sarasota, Caldwell Trust Company, Venice

Group Exhibits:  Chicago, Sarasota, Venice, Manatee,  Longboat Key, Port Charlotte, St. Petersburg, Winter Park, Clearwater, Ocala, St Augustine, Tallahassee, Fort   Myers.

State Exhibits:  Winter Park, Ocala, Clearwater, Orlando

National Exhibits:  Kansas City, Mississippi, New York, Washington              

International Exhibits: Paris, France, Centre International de L’ Art Contemporain

Special Winners Exhibits:  West Coast Parade of Prize Winners, Longboat Key FL., Sumner Museum, Washington, DC, Cork Gallery, Lincoln Center, New York, Venice Visionaries, Venice FL, Richard Dean Andruk Memorial Award, Florida Artist Group, Tallahassee, WCA “Women of the Year”, WCA “Lifetime Member award”.

Periodicals:  Artists of Florida, Vol II, III, IV, (Mountain Productions, Texas) Scene Magazine-1995 Annual (Sarasota)