Merlene Mazyck

About the Artist

Painting is an act of love for me. Came to the medium after 60 when my daughter gifted me a set of acrylic paints and challenged me to stop talking about it and just do it. Signed up for a class at TP municipal building with Alice Sims, one of the artists featured on this site, shortly thereafter to learn the basics and have been painting every since. I like to paint portraits, landscapes and still life but think I enjoy portraits best. Very exciting to see a subject’s essence emerge on the canvas. I am influenced by the Impressionists, the way they use color to bring life to their subjects and subjects…Gauguin, Van Gogh, Mary Cassatt, Monet and many others. I am motivated by images of daily life and faces that show people’s experiences and feelings in the moment. The reason I paint is because it brings me joy to capture an idea of something that is my perspective. I have lived in Takoma Park since 1996 and am a volunteer with Takoma Artery. This community has been wonderfully supportive, very grateful to be a part of it.