From her first love of creating photo-realistic human portraits, Rebecca has since developed a passion for portraying the wild creatures in a more unique and personalized style. While maintaining a strong and accurate suggestion of form and likeness, her palette and mark-making choices now venture into a more abstract dimension which allows for a connection to something larger than just the realistic portrayal of an animal’s shell.
Many of her images come from animal dreams where the creatures visit her. She believes that they have messages for us, lessons to teach, and that she is being asked to communicate this through her paintings. The more she honors these beings, the more they come to her in dreams. They stir a magical world within her that reveals to her eye a more mystical, magical world on the outside as well.
Rebecca mixes oil paint and china markers (grease pencils) on her wooden surfaces. She prefers the strength and feel of the wood over paper or canvas. She begins with an image in mind and then follows where it leads, allowing the essence, or true spirit of the animal, to emerge now rather than confining it to its physical attributes alone. Often her pieces suggest a story or fable that may include a trickster of sorts or spirits that are part creature and part human.