BIOGRAPHY
Victoria was born in Panama City, Panama with a passion for art from a very early age. She first attended Moore College of Art in Philadelphia but did not pursue painting as a full time career after college since she was not inspired by the abstract movement at that time, which so strongly influenced most artist careers. With the recent revival of classical art instruction and a renewed appreciation for drawing skills and realism, Victoria moved to NY in 2007 to learn alongside some of the most important contemporary classical realist artists. She first studied at the Art Student League under Nelson Shank and privately with Steven Assael and Mark Tennant. In 2008 Victoria's desire to study with Jacob Collins led her to The Water Street Atelier at The Grand Central Academy of Art, an institution founded on the ideals of academic realism, where she completed an intensive four-year core program. Imagen Gallery in Panama City, Panama and Saltfineart in Laguna Beach, Californina represent Victoria. She will be part of a group show at the Bonner David Gallery in Scottsdale, Arizona in May 2014. Currently, she paints and teaches privately from her studio in Montclair, NJ. Artist Statement My art is as much an expression of my own inner life and my own struggle to maintain equilibrium as it is about my observations of the world around and its people. The passion I feel while creating comes from my core and has always been the driving force in my life. I compose each painting with the hope that the viewer finds rest or a pause for renewal and reflection in it. May the colors and interplay of light and shadow be restoring, energizing. May the forms and draftsmanship intrigue your curiosity about what inspires my creativity. My paintings acknowledge our common need to greater awareness, to observing more, to feeling more. I intend that my work contribute my best efforts to this process of our collective awakening. My vocation as a painter is to counter the atmosphere of superficiality that prevails in a culture that accepts what is easy, that celebrates the banal, that forgets the past. My style is contemporary reflecting my subject matter, but is deeply rooted in classical artistic training in the tradition of the Old Masters. My work covers a wide variety of subjects., but what remains consistent throughout is a deep love and respect for beauty and nature. It is intuitive and highly symbolic and the direction it takes each time is often surprising, even to me.