Emerging Artist | Kelli Folsom - Southwest Art Magazine

Beauty for beauty’s sake

Kelli Folsom, Clementines and Eucalyptus, oil, 20 x 16.

This story was featured in the March 2013 issue of Southwest Art magazine. Order the Southwest Art March 2013 print issue, or get the Southwest Art March 2013 digital download now…Or better yet, just subscribe to Southwest Art and never miss a story!

The highlight on a copper teapot, a brilliantly colored orange, the soft lavender shade of a snapdragon—these are a few of the things that might inspire Oklahoma-based artist Kelli Folsom. “I choose things that are beautiful and things that are beautiful together, whether it’s peaches, tangerines, satin, lace, metal, or porcelain,” Folsom says. She currently tends to favor metal objects because they are both challenging and intriguing to capture in oil paint. “The metal has huge value contrast and will reflect and pick up all the other colors going on in the still-life arrangement,” Folsom says.

Folsom is a member of the Oil Painters of America, and this month her still lifes are on view at the Western Masters Art Show & Sale in Great Falls, MT, for the first time. At 33 years old, she will be among the younger artists in the juried event.

Born and raised in the Texas Panhandle near Amarillo, Folsom moved to Oklahoma as a teenager. Her love of art began early. “I always found drawing to be a source of peace and joy,” she says. “It was not merely an enjoyable activity but a place inside of me that I could go anytime as long as I had pencil and paper.”

Kelli Folsom, Santa Fe Clay With Leaves, oil, 12 x 24.

Folsom received her bachelor of fine arts degree from Lyme Academy College of Fine Arts in Lyme, CT, and has also studied with Sherrie McGraw and Leah Lopez. In 2011 she received the prestigious John F. and Anna Lee Stacey Scholarship through the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City, which allowed her to study the masters at Europe’s grand museums. Her paintings reflect her affection for works by the old masters, who also employed dramatic use of lighting.

Folsom seldom has a favorite work because, in her mind, the favorite is always the next one on the easel: “The finished painting has no possibilities left, whereas a future painting has all new possibilities for me to discover.” —Bonnie Gangelhoff

representation
Tirage Fine Art, Pasadena, CA; Whistle Pik Galleries, Fredericksburg, TX; Howell Gallery, Oklahoma City, OK; www.kellifolsom.com.

Featured in the March 2013 issue of Southwest Art magazine–click below to purchase:
Southwest Art March 2013 digital download
Southwest Art March 2013 print issue
Or subscribe to Southwest Art and never miss a story!