Featured Artist : Evelyn Jenkins DrewEJD Designs

My goal is to paint the beauty around me and make it glow from within the silk's luminescence. On a two dimensional surface, I sculpt the subject with shadows and color that seem to magically impart volume and life. Flowers exceed their actual size to attain an intimate presence within the viewer. My most treasured compliments came twice when birds flew into a gallery to get to my flower paintings!

Subjects that most inspire my creative processes are local and tropical landscapes, animals, and flowers. I have won the Capitola (California) Begonia Festival poster four times, twice with paintings on silk and twice with watercolors. One painting has a huge white cumulus begonia cloud. Another has a begonia forming in the white water of a wave. A favorite format is a strong foreground of large flowers or animals with a landscape in the background. I paint mainly with Jacquard dyes on China silk and silk twill. I teach in my studio and I participate in Santa Cruz's Open Studio Tour each October.

The silk painting technique is called gutta serti, in which areas are surrounded with a resist called gutta and then dyes are painted on with watercolor brushes. The process involves setting the dyes, dry cleaning to remove the gutta, and stretching the silk before framing. Because I control the dyes by thickening them and use No-Flo, I can minimize the use of the gutta and make my silk paintings look more like watercolors.

My art has appeared in national magazines such as Threads and Surface Design, the cover of Prelude Magazine, catalog covers, wine labels, and in Susan Moyer's latest book, Silk Painting for Fashion and Fine Art.

Education: B.A., Art, San Jose State Univ.

Evelyn Jenkins Drew,
EJD Designs