Meet the Artist: Lourdes Rosas Rasdall

Art was my first love and has been a driving force in my life, although not always in the forefront. College took me from the Caribbean to the Tampa Bay area, where I received my Bachelor of Arts from Eckerd College in St. Petersburg, FL. Later, I studied and practiced commercial art.  As most art students, I trained in the traditional mediums and methods, and gravitated towards watermedia early on. My art took a backseat with a corporate job and raising a family, but eventually I returned to pursuing what I love doing most.

I have been showing my art publicly and actively since 2002 and teaching painting since 2015.  I have taught group classes and workshops, as well as private instruction in watercolor, watercolor sketching & art journaling.  In 2019, I traded a corporate career for a more creative lifestyle. As an independent artist, I kept busy with galleries, group shows, commissions, community projects, and teaching painting classes and workshops. In 2021, I was offered a position as Director of Suntan Art Center in St. Pete Beach, FL, which I kept until I moved to Sneads Ferry, NC in January 2024.

Today, I work in my home studio in watermedia, two-dimensional mixed media paintings, and to a lesser extent, kiln-formed glass. I love watercolor the most, for its fluidity, simplicity, and portability. Surprisingly, watercolor is also suitable for mixed media work, and I often incorporate other elements in my watercolors, like pen & ink for line detail, gesso or other acrylic mediums for texture and resists, or embellish a finished watercolor with collage. I am interested in stretching the medium beyond tradition and exploring the possibilities.  Having lived in the tropics for most of my live, my world is colorful and bright.  I am still exploring nature and the coastline, but now with mountains just a drive away, I am also exploring other scenery. I paint what makes me happy and my art is an interpretation of the world as I see it: colorful, beautiful and bright.

From the Tampa Bay to the North Carolina coast, I find inspiration in the local scenery. In Florida, I was represented by St. Pete Artworks and the Craftsmen Gallery at Suntan Art Center in St. Pete Beach. In North Carolina, I am teaching workshops at Leland Cultural Arts Center and just getting settled in my new art community.