About The Artist
Biography
Caitlin Calcagnini is a visual artist and certified life coach focusing on therapeutic art and personal transformation. She began drawing in her childhood years, creating greeting cards, book illustrations and dabbling in art classes. Drawing became a joyful, meditative practice that she continued to explore while participating in student art shows and events. As her interest grew, she became more serious about her future in art and attended a pre-collage Summer program at Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, NY in 2000. Her experience ignited her passion for drawing from life and interest in realism. There is where she discovered oil painting. After graduating high school in 2001, she spent the next two years studying art at the Delaware Collage of Art and Design. She earned her associates in fine arts in 2003, shortly followed by her acceptance to the Hartford Art School at the University of Hartford with a portfolio scholarship. Caitlin earned her bachelors degree in 2005 and began her career as a commission artist working on projects such as animal portraiture, murals and illustration. Throughout her career, she has participated in art shows and juried exhibitions at locations such as The Kent Art Association in Kent CT, The Ridgefield Guild of Artists in Ridgefield, CT, and more recently The Vermont Arts Council in Londonderry, VT. She currently lives in Southern Vermont and works out of her home studio. Her choice of media are charcoal, oil, watercolor, ink and mixed media. She continuous to specialize in animal portraiture and nature art.
The idea The Nature Painter was created out of the love and respect for all living things and the joy of painting the natural world.
Artist Statement
I create to ground myself and celebrate my love of form, light and color. It brings me immense joy to emulate with my own interpretation the likeness of the subject matter. When I focus on the accuracy, I am not only measuring and forming a composition, I am also absorbing character and presence reflecting the essence of what I see. My highest goal is to bring forth that feeling of having the subject being there with the viewer.