Explore the Arts > In-House Studio Artists

In-House Studio Artists

ACBV studio artists rent a space at The Arts Council to continue creating and displaying masterpieces! Our current studio artists are:

  • Chris Wilson, Watercolor Artist
  • Coleen Bradfield, Acrylic Artist

Feel free to visit, see their work, and watch them progress their work from beginning to end!

 

Meet the Artists

Chris Wilson, Watercolor ArtistChris Wilson, Watercolor Artist

I paint because I am drawn to the beautiful simplicity of light in creating shape, color, and contrast. I picked watercolor because I thought if I could master capturing the light with it, I could keep my paintings simple without getting fussy. Watercolor is anything but simple, but if you do it well, it appears just that. I graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Indiana University in 1983. I thought I would teach in the public schools, but found a job in Dallas working as a commercial artist for a small corporation. Then there were many years of raising kids and volunteering when I stored the art supplies in the attic, but it was during that period that I became interested in watercolor. Each year our family took a beach vacation in Florida where local artists captured the essence of the sky and ocean and children playing in the sand with watercolor. Later when my kids went off to college, I joined an adult watercolor class. There was so much to learn about interpreting what I saw through this medium, and I am still learning, even though now I am teaching that class. I may paint a variety of subjects, but I am consistently striving to find the simplicity of light in creating its shapes, color and contrast. My goal in painting is to share what I find beautiful in these elements with others.

Coleen Bradfield, Acrylic ArtistColeen Bradfield, Acrylic Artist

Coleen Bradfield is an artist, an educator and a scientist. She is also a wife, mother and grandmother. As a child she was a constant doodler and her hobby of painting, drawing and sculpting in clay continued right into college. Coleen’s academic career began at Ohio State University where she majored in Fine Art. Marriage and children took her back to her beloved state of Florida where she completed her academic journey at Florida Institute of Technology in Melbourne, Florida. For years her career was teaching students chemistry and research and later being involved in research herself. This left little time for her passion for painting and sculpting. Now in retirement with children grown she is able to indulge in her lifelong love of the arts.

Coleen loves painting and exploring various mediums including mixed media, encaustics and resins. She often approaches painting in an intuitive manner where the focus is on layers of colors and shapes. Using fluid and heavy bodied acrylics with varying degrees of opacity is her preference as it allows her to play with composition and values which often combines the abstract and representational. Coleen has been painting zebras in acrylic and oil since the 1960’s and continues to enjoy incorporating patterns of nature, wildlife and birds, especially shore birds and owls in many of her paintings. While she still has times when she immerses herself in reality and her classical training it is the process of creating and sharing that she loves. Coleen also sculpts in clay. She took a sabbatical from teaching to complete an internship in sculpting and foundry work and has in recent years started transforming her clay sculptures into bronze. Her paintings and sculptures have won numerous awards and been exhibited in galleries and homes throughout the United States as well as Germany and Austria.