About Louise
I work out of my studio at Leverett Crafts & Arts in my town of Leverett and show my work locally at Sawmill River Arts at The Montague Mill (BookMill). I paint mostly on site in New England and in the Southwest when I teach at Ghost Ranch where Georgia O’Keefe lived and painted.
My only formal art education was in the 6th grade when my mother hired an art teacher to teach some of the neighborhood kids around our ping pong table in the basement – no art classes in our grade school. I loved it, and I still remember everything that teacher said!
I didn’t take art in high school or college, but as an adult, I worked with several professional painters and excellent painting buddies. I learned a great deal from all of them.
Through the years, I have tackled portraits, historical interpretive paintings, bookbinding and printmaking. I have been an outdoor “plein air” landscape painter for over forty years, passionate about painting “fast and loose” – a wild woman just loving fresh air, dramatic light, the excitement of attacking the canvas with brush and paint. I was never a “detail” painter, always much more slap dash. Color and drama still grab me first, and I try to grab them!
![Louise Minks in her home working on a painting](jpg/louise-minks-painting-indoors-min-1024x768.jpg)
![Louise Minks in front of a red mill, holding a paintbrush and smiling as she paints the mill](jpg/louise-minks-painting-outdoors-at-mill-min-1024x1016.jpg)