SeaHart: a heart shaped rock found on the beach that is a little sign of love.

My paintings are an extension of my travels and personal experimentation with form and color vibrancy. I continue to explore the world, take many photos, and am always collecting images for inspiration and guidance. Lately, the impetus for my work has come from conversations with dear friends who describe vivid dreams and journeys.

I work in acrylics and often paint with a specific person or place in mind. But sometimes after I've laid the base colors and texture, the spaces and depth of the canvas guide me into alleys, onto beaches, or present a person whom I'm to paint. I prop the canvas against my fireplace and sketch the different possibilities within it. I usually find several options as I turn the canvas around and around but know which image to paint when it won't leave. Sometimes it's immediate. Sometimes it takes several days.

As a fourth generation artist, I can only claim to be pseudo-self taught. I believe that my artistic education began before birth, as both my parents are exceptional artists. Each has had a profound impact upon my painting style. Gwendolyn Atwood, my mother, emphasizes color and movement, while my dad, Karl Sebastian, coaches me on perspective and layout. Growing up, my four siblings and I constantly created art alongside our parents. I fondly cherish our family art outings to museums and excursions into inspiring landscapes where we explored techniques together. More than anything, my parents taught me to look breathlessly into the world around me, blur my vision a little, and embrace the creative process of living beyond my limitations.