AVERY Kelly’s first bachelor’s degree was in environmental studies, and the second was in fine art. She has combined the two academic interests into a passion for paintings and relief prints featuring animals and landscapes. “I love working with paint in various ways,” says the Fort Worth artist.
“I do a lot of birds and animals we have here in Texas, such as roadrunners, foxes, deer and burrowing owls.”
Her oil paintings are colorful and vibrant, showing animals in their natural settings, as well as coastal landscapes of water and sky. Picture a roadrunner on alert, a fox staring at you from the forest’s edge, a deer in a serene aspen stand. Kelly’s other artistic medium is relief printing, also of animals and landscapes. Inspired by her love of the contrasts in Pueblo pottery, the prints are black-and-white images made from linocuts and hand pulled through a printing press. A new area of investigation for Kelly is whimsical, small-scale acrylic paintings that convey a storybook feeling. She’ll also do commissions, including pets, homes and landscapes. Capturing a sense of expression and character in pet portraits is something she particularly enjoys. Notecards with images of Kelly’s work are also available.