“Everywhere I turn all the beauty just keeps shaking me.” This line from an Indigo Girls song really resonates with me. I find beauty nearly everywhere I look, from old rusty vehicles to landscapes all across the nation. I grew up in Arkansas and worked as a public-school art teacher for 20 years teaching first High School and then Elementary, a job I found to be both rewarding and exhausting. After moving to Baton Rouge in 2018 I finally found my tribe in Baton Rouge Plein Air, a group that meets every Thursday morning to paint all around the area. I painted in watercolors for two decades before being inspired to switch to oils in 2019. I paint almost exclusively en plein air, or outside on location, where I can really focus on my subject, and be in the environment as well as in the moment. The challenge of both simplifying the subject and capturing the fleeting light in my paintings keeps me energized. I enjoy painting with a palette knife once I have the basic composition drawn in with a brush. I desire to abstract the landscape to a point, but still have the subject instantly recognizable. I travel frequently to paint, sometimes for official plein air events, but often just to enjoy and attempt to capture varied landscapes on my canvas. I recently began volunteering with the Arts in Medicine program at Baton Rouge General and am honored to have my work included in this exhibit.