BLOG: Featured Artist - Amy Rims

Our first featured artist is Amy Rims of Lansdale who is a member of the North Penn Arts Alliance. 

She paints different subjects and models which can be seen in the links listed below.  She has
enlightened me on the subject of Live Action Painting where she goes to an event, paints the
environment and then oil paints people that are in attendance.  She has recently gotten into
this form of painting and among other events she does Lansdale's First Fridays. So if you attend

First Friday to take in some local art culture you may very well end up in a painting!

At one point she realized that she could name only three famous women painters and she
decided to do something about that.  While she attended art school to become a teacher she
was taught to try to motivate minorities in the field.  These spurred her to start running
her own womens' painting group out of her Lansdale home.

Currently she is working on selling prints of her artwork, which you can order from the second  featured link below, to save up enough money to open her own art cafe where artists can enjoy  art, live music and snacks/beverages.  A very worthwile goal that would be beneficial to many!

Now for a little Q&A with the artist herself.

Q:  At what point in your life did you decide to pursue arts with such passion?

A:  "I have been passionate about art for as far back as I remember. In kindergarten I had decided  that I'd either be an artist or a backhoe driver, as I grew up backhoe driver, for some reason  became less appealing. Then as a grew I began to realize the impact art has on people and set  myself to impact others through art."

Q:  What known artists have either directly impacted your style and/or have motivated your work?

A:  "I get inspired by art in all forms, but my two favorite unrelated painters are  Claude Monet and Frida Kahlo.When I was in elementary school, I attended something in which a guy dressed up like Monet and spoke about art, he said as Monet something to this effect, that a great artists should be able to paint so quickly that if he jumped off a large building while
painting, the painting should be complete by the time he hits the ground. I was really impressed  with the idea of that and through college my professors reinforced the concept of getting images down quickly without over laboring and overthinking. I try to create with great speed like Monet.
I had the privilege of visiting Monet's garden's in Giverny and that inspired me further to put
efforts into my art as well as my home and garden. I've also spent a lot of time studying Frida
Kahlo's work. For a while I was creating works that reflected personal narratives of my life in
 the way she created. She had a very tragic life in which she used art to escape, and I have
followed her example to use art to get over some rough things in my own life."

Q:  What impact has our region had on your work and ambitions?

A:  "I feel fortunate to have grown up in this area and to have gone through the North Penn School District which has great funding and a wide variety of art classes to encourage me at a young age."

Q:  Aside from opening an art cafe do you have any other art-oriented goals?

A:  "I would like to have a showing of my Lansdale Live Action paintings. Once I complete a few more and frame them, I'm going to search out a venue to showcase them. Ideally, I'd like to have them hung in a public friendly space for a good length of time."

Q:  What do you believe would make you most proud (be the biggest honor) of everything that you do as far as art is concerned?

A:  "When I learn that I have inspired someone else to create, I feel honored. Sometimes my children tell people that they are my painters and it makes my heart happy."

Amy's work already has a solid impact on our local arts and if her dreams come to
fruition, the impact could become enormous!  She is using her teaching knowledge
to help aspiring female artists realize their potential which would only increase
the amount and styles of artwork that come from our area.

And the impact on our local art culture would be immense if she is able to
open an arts cafe. Not just for visual art but also allowing another venue for
local musicians to have their music heard. Visual and auditory art have always
gone hand-in-hand which explains movies having soundtracks and songs have music
videos.  They enhance each other and can create an overall great experience.

You can connect with Amy and her artwork through a couple of channels!

http://amyrims.wordpress.com/: This will take you to Amy's person art blog where she displays current pieces and often times she discusses the motivation for and thought processes involved with each piece.  There are also great examples of the live action painting method discussed earlier.

Amy is always looking for 'models' to paint so you can check our her work and if you would like to be used in a future work of hers you can contact her about it.

www.amyrims.imagekind.com: You can visit this site to not only see completed works that she had mentioned being in progress in her blog as well as purchase prints directly from the site.  She hopes to use all proceeds to save up to start the art cafe.  One could view this as her way of giving back to an area whose public school system encouraged her to pursue the arts.

Additionally, anyone holding any kind of event that would like live action paintings created
to commemorate the event can contact her for rates.  Not only do you benefit from an original, custom painting that you can cherish but our area can benefit greatly from also.

I want to thank Amy for taking the time to get me up-to-speed and for answering my questions.  And I want to thank all of you, dear readers, for coming along and learning abour our culture with me.