| _________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ |
| r i c e p a p e r a r t |
| karen mills |
 |
| Copyright (c) 2006 Karen Mills |
| Art unexpectedly found me. I did not paint, displayed zero interest in art and fell asleep in museums. I woke up one day with this intense desire to paint. When I first picked up the Chinese Brush and painted on Rice-Paper - I fell in love. I am mainly self-taught. I practiced and experimented on my own, read books, visited China, sought feedback and examined my life. In Chinese spontaneous painting - the essence of the subject is expressed with one or as few strokes as possible. Color variations, wet/dry strokes, etc are all done in one stroke! The honesty, simplicity, efficiency and speed appeals to me - probably because it's a reflection of who I am. I paint spontaneously, driven by my feelings and subconscious. I love bright colors and contrast - different from traditional Chinese paintings. This is why I call my work "Watercolors on Rice-Paper" I had no warning this would happen. I was born in Malaysia, adopted by a Chinese family. A Science student at an early age, I didn't get to explore art, music or dance. We immigrated to Australia when I was 17. I graduated with a chemistry and computer science undergraduate degree and a chemistry graduate degree. I fell into the computing Industry - for 17 years I worked crazy hours, travelling all over the world. While at Oracle, I was relocated to California in 1991. 8 years at Oracle, 2 great years at Microsoft and 5 painful startups .... the executive management level was chock full of politics but I was fortunate to have enjoyed many successes. I kept my sanity by dancing a lot - salsa, samba, ballroom, swing, hustle, hip-hop. All alone in the world, to survive and succeed, I developed many skills to compete and win ... eventually becoming a typical type 'A'. However, at heart, I am not and over the years, my soul was dying a slow death. The creative process of painting has allowed my true personality to surface and it's very healing. I bounced between Northern California and New York for several years, studying with an exceptional art coach - Mr. Jin in New York who has had a tremendous impact on my work. I now live in Southern California and teach workshops in Santa Clarita, Laguna Beach and San Juan Capistrano. |
 |
| bio |