I was born and raised in small town Saskatchewan, and have always been an artist at heart.

I am entirely self-taught, and dabbled artistically in all manner of mediums, but never focussed on anything specific. In 2008, a fellow artist saw some of my work in pencil and gave me a set of soft pastels to try out. He said I would probably enjoy them if I enjoyed graphite. I tested them out that night and was hooked! I spent months learning techniques by trial and error and practicing with the soft pastels.  I upgraded my soft pastel collection, experimented with different papers, and converted half of my garage to studio space so I could make a mess and walk away without someone tripping over my stuff in the house.

Once I had a handle on using the pastels, I began to upgrade my basic drawing skills. I poured over books on animal anatomy, studied the work of popular animal portrait artists, and signed up for a night class on drawing the human figure. I developed a method to taking a client photograph and creating an accurate rough copy and a system to turning this rough draft into a pastel painting.  I am a perfectionist when it comes to my artwork, and I wasn’t satisfied until I was able to consistently attain a high level of realism.

With a lot of help and support from family and friends, I felt ready to share my artwork with the public, and try to make my dream of becoming a full time artist a reality. I launched “Gazelle Fine Art” on Facebook in the summer of 2010, and www.Gazellefineart.com in March of 2013.  The response to my artwork has been astounding, and I thank each and every one of my clients for referring friends, handing out my business cards, and supporting my dream of being a full time artist by commissioning portraits!

When I am not in the studio  I enjoy working with my horses and competing in Autocross racing with the Saskatoon Sports Car Club.