STEPHANIE SIPP ~ ARTIST
My life story and art story are inextricably woven together. As a young person, I never knew that art could be a viable part of my life.
When I started grad school, I could not have predicted that an elective interior design course would open the door for me to be a professional creative. But it did, and for the next decade, I helped my interior design clients organize their spaces and colorize their lives.
Later, as an art supply store manager, I discovered a passion for creating my own art. I played with materials, from paints to paper collage, and had a grand time. After I took art courses, and became involved in the art community, I began to see my work in galleries and art shows.
That journey has lead to my life as a nature and wildlife illustrator. Nature connects me to spirit and motivates my creative thinking. My love of nature’s diverse beauty and its ever changing presence, both day to day and season to season, inspires me. Forms, juxtapositions, colors, details and textures fascinate me. If you and I encounter each other hiking through the mountains, you will notice my ever present sketchbook and camera. Every day I study and visually record garden flowers, wildflowers, mushrooms and other treasures that catch my attention.
Back in my studio I use the visual references I have sketched and photographed to inspire and direct my illustrations. I start with a pencil drawing, and create a carefully considered composition which I refine as I develop the skeleton of the image with pen and sepia ink. Striving towards a realistic interpretation of my subject, I use design markers or colored pencils to lay in areas of color that reflect a natural appearance. When the design and color rendering represents the subject and my experience with it, balance is achieved and the artwork is completed.
Life presents herself as a visual and kinesthetic experience. To see and notice are essential aspects of drawing, which in itself involves movement - of eye and hand, body and imagination. Through this lens, I observe and explore my surroundings. In natural sequence I draw, design, create art, teach and mentor others. The journey is tangible - an experience - an illustration, a work of art - and whenever I can share this creativity with others… sparking special lifetime connections.
In 2022 I saw a dream come true ~ my first coloring book was published!
Flowers to Color: Ways to Cultivate, Connect, and Protect invites you to sharpen your pencils, and to sharpen your mind. Detailed, accurately rendered illustrations of flowers, butterflies and bees offers coloring book enthusiasts the opportunity to bring these flowers to life in vivid color.
This educational coloring book includes:
Ways to create sustainable backyard gardens that enrich wildlife habitats; nourish pollinators; and provide nutrients for humans as well as animals.
Fact filled pages providing information about each plant and their special characteristics: why they are important to bees: how they can create habituates for local wildlife.
Simple recipes for using certain flowers and an understanding of the medicinal components many of them provide.
Ways to deepen your connection with the plants around you and become a better steward of the environment.
In this coloring book I share my love and enthusiasm for flowers and take you beyond coloring into eco-friendly gardening and the active role played by pollinators in restoring and maintaining the biodiversity that keeps our ecosystem healthy!