about me

biography

Born on Route 66 in Oklahoma City, USA, yet raised primarily in Houston, Texas. While young, she also lived in San Diego & Los Angeles, California and St. Louis, Missouri. Bethany earned her first degree in Visual Communications from The Art Institute of Houston, Texas (1993) and subsequently worked professionally as a graphic designer (for all manner of print media) and as a decorative artist (theatrical sets, props, store display and home interiors) while continuing to create, exhibit and sell her own personal work as a painter.

In 2002 Bethany married a French climate scientist and began following his career which took them to: Athens, Greece (2004); Cambridge, Massachusetts (2007); and Utrecht, The Netherlands (2010), where they have lived ever since with their trilingual children and two orange cats while slowly renovating a 100-year-old townhouse near the center of the quaint college town.

Bethany earned her second degree at the Utrecht University of Applied Sciences (2020), but this time as an English teacher. She now teaches English as a second language to creative media & communication majors at a local vocational school and continues to paint and draw, exhibit and sell her work as time allows.

Bethany’s rich and diverse life experience brings much influence to her work. Brightly expressionistic and modern, she combines broad strokes and splashes with imagery around frequent themes in her work: the built environment & our place in it, our increasingly unnatural relationship to each other, and our planet. She signs her work with a signature 'bug' who she refers to as her "fellow traveler", and who gives her a unique perspective on the world around us.

artist statement

Frequent themes in my work are cityscapes, communications & current events as well as the occasional graph. My style is often expressionistic, and at times incorporates representational drawings of architecture or maps in overlay. It’s rather theatrical with lots of deep and bright colors and preferably on objects that lend a depth of experience and history to the work. I aim for a visceral connection to the work, using splashes of paint and textures often with a raw and unfinished quality to root the viewer to our shared physical existence. I paint with mixed media, but lean heavily towards latex/acrylic, often on recycled materials such as windows or cabinet doors. Finding the different elements, whether they are the pieces to paint on and references to draw from, are part of the complete process of a life dedicated to discovering and understanding the always changing way things are and seem. The bug, my signature, is my fellow traveler. He is an alter ego who reminds me to see the world from a different perspective, understands the twisted nature of “roots”, and easily navigates everything I think is difficult.