Below is a partial list of MRAA members. The complete list may be found here.
Manuel Arias
Manuel Arias was born and raised in Indianapolis to immigrant parents. His upbringing paradoxically consisted of a suburban-American experience along with traditional Latin values where celebration was constant. Although he was often exposed to diverse forms of expression through music, dance, cuisine, and paintings from his family, he began to understand his own creative potential after moving to Chicago. He began to study the “greats” of art and could not satiate his thirst for the tradition. Manuel quickly found that the root of his love for art came from its expression of authentic human experience. Manuel’s art seeks to celebrate what it means to be human: to experience emotion authentically. He encourages others to feel rather than think when viewing his art; to be mindfully present. Manuel finds empowerment in the freedom of being a self-taught artist who hopes to inspire others to realize their own capacity to create from their own unique experience.
Susan Arnold
Lois Baird
Diane Balister
Diane paints in her studio in Scott’s Addition and on location when the opportunity presents itself – most often using oil on canvas. She creates contemporary, original paintings of people, creatures, and her impressions of the world we live in. She is especially fond of lively colors and movement. She is a native of Virginia, where she met her husband Michael, and they raised their large, blended family. She has traveled extensively, often visiting Great Britain where her husband was born. She draws from her life experiences and travels in her work. She moved to the Charleston, SC area in 2000 and discovered the joy of painting en plein air. She has recently returned to her native Virginia. Her portraits of animals and children are in demand and her paintings from life are on display in many homes and galleries. More examples of her work can be found at balister.com. Contact Diane for a studio visit, or to attend one of her many local shows, by email: diane@balister.com.
Megha Baran
Johnye Bennett
Che Billingsley
Che’ is an artist who specializes in oil and watercolor landscapes and still life. Her passion for art began in kindergarten when her teachers recognized her exceptional artistic skills while she was living in New Orleans. From a young age, Che’ took private art lessons and continued her artistic education throughout her life. She studied art studio every semester while attending the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
In 1981, she moved to Richmond, VA, and currently lives in Manakin Sabot, VA. After retiring from her private dental practice in 2015, she expanded her art studio and now enjoys painting oil landscapes and still life almost every day. Her extensive travels inspire her creativity in all her artistic endeavors. Che’ has received numerous international and national gallery awards for her impressionistic paintings. “Art is Life,” she states.
You can contact Che’ at Cheartist@protonmail.com.
“Art is the breath of life!” For more information, visit her website: cheartist.com
Nellie Rose Blair
Nellie Rose Blair is an intuitive painter inspired by yoga, meditation, and nature. Her passion is creating large abstract paintings with a spontaneous yet contemplative quality. In her representational work, she is drawn to elements of nature such as aspen trees, ginkgo leaves, zinnias, and roses. For Nellie, the artistic process feeds her spiritual practice, and her kundalini yoga and meditation practice helps to fuel her creative vision.
Instagram: nellie.rose.blooms
Aaron Bowles
Aaron Bowles is a contemporary painter whose themes involve nature, dreams, relationships, and our connection to each other. His abstract landscapes focus on water, light, and the deep woods, while his dramatic figurative pieces explore the mystery between men and women. He paints in a contemporary expressionist style emphasizing light, using colorful, textured compositions and abstract structure. Aaron studied painting at East Carolina University and is a graduate of the Communication Arts program at VCU. A former Assistant Professor of Art at George Mason University, he has worked as an illustrator and animator, specializing in digital media. Aaron also writes mystery novels about an ex-FBI Art Crime agent. AaronBowles.com
Russell Brown
I’m pursuing one of my long-term goals of doing personal work. One of the mediums that has always interested me is painting. I recall walking through the painting department in college soaking in the smells and energy that were ever-present in the studios. I wanted to try my hand at it! What freedom.
I’ve picked-up on thoughts, challenges and beauty that I’d left in my mental shed for years. Some as benign as a still life, others that are meant to tell a story. All of which I hope will register emotionally and aesthetically. I’ve found that it is important to show evidence of process in my work. It tells a sub-story of development leaving traces of the past, the scars that have healed.
I am enjoying the challenge of painting and personal expression. It’s more difficult than I’d anticipated—looking for the poetry in life. It takes effort to consider worthy topics. It takes patience to develop skills. It takes courage to execute the vision. But when it all comes together, all the tangential themes intersect to create the possible, it is so rewarding.
Russ Brown
2932 Halstead RD
N Chesterfield, VA 23235
(C) 703-217-3829
Lisa Burke
James Burnette
Paul Candido
Bari Cohen
Teresa Cramer
Born in Fort Wayne, Indiana, Teresa loved drawing, painting, and being creative with crafts throughout her childhood. Her mother was very gifted in drawing, but had never learned to paint. Once Teresa was an adult, they took a few painting lessons together, unlocking hidden passion and creativity. She continued to pursue this interest with private lessons, workshops, books and online study over the years.
Teresa, now retired as a physical therapist, paints daily. Her oil-painting style is loosly rendered and impressionistic, using bold brush work and broken color. She strives to evoke emotion in viewers of her paintings. She enjoys painting plein air, usually outside, then often paints larger pieces in her studio from plein air studies or from photographs. She feels a strong emotional and spiritual connection to nature, and is drawn to pastoral scenes, country hillsides, or mountains, rivers and streams.
Vicky Daniel
Joanne Fisher
Susan Fisher
Showing us an impressionistic dance between sketch and realism, Susan Fisher paints with a distinctive style. Many of her images are from “the mind’s eye” taking us to places that we have never been and conveying feelings that resonate with most viewers. Self trained, she has painted prolifically since she was 12 years old. As an adult, she studied in studio for eight years with Professor Erjun Zhao focused on portrait, landscape and figure. Susan is the president of the Metropolitan Richmond Artists Association. She grew up in the city of Richmond and lives there still. SusanFisherArt.com
Laura Goetz
James Green
James is a maker, creator, artist and craftsman. Although James was born and raised in the mountains of western Maryland, he has been a resident of the Richmond area for more than 40 years and sees no where else as home. His love of nature and the outdoors drives and inspires his landscapesque abstract paintings.
Follow him on Instagram at walkingontheedgestudio, email to james@walkingontheedge.studio
The James Green Fine Art Gallery
Katy Haskell
Katy Haskell studied art history at the University of Virginia and began painting 15 years ago. Katy’s mentors include Dawn Whitelaw, Robin Caspari, Matt Lively, Paula Wachsstock and Jane Joyner. Working in an impressionistic style, she paints primarily in oil. She often exhibits her work in Richmond and Nantucket, as well as online at www.KatyHaskell.com.
Katy’s professional career was in marketing and advertising. After her first child was born, she left the working world to stay at home and began taking art lessons.
Mother Nature is constantly inspiring Katy’s art. Whether it is scenes from the James River, a shoreline at a beach, or the way the sun hits an interior scene, Katy tries to capture an emotional response in each of her paintings.
Katy enjoys collaborating with clients on commissions. When Katy and her clients identify imagery that will capture the scene the client wants to immortalize through a painting, magic can happen!
Follow Katy on Instagram and Facebook at @katyhaskellfineart or on her website at www.KatyHaskell.com. Please contact her at katy@katyhaskell.com.
Mike Haubenstock
Mike Haubenstock, based in Glen Allen, Virginia, captivates viewers with his oil paintings of landscapes and still lifes. With a passion for architecture, natural scenery, and vibrant displays, his artistic journey began around 20 years ago. Haubenstock’s paintings stand at a thoughtful intersection of timeless tradition and modern resonance. Rooted in the legacy of representational art, his still lifes and landscapes celebrate the quiet poetry of everyday moments — wildflowers catching morning light, sunsets glowing through a forest, or fruits and vegetables rendered with rich realism.
In a contemporary art world often driven by conceptual complexity or minimal abstraction, Haubenstock’s work offers a counterbalance. His vibrant color, expressive brushwork, and layered textures invite viewers to slow down, savor detail, and reconnect with beauty as a form of emotional refuge. His paintings answer today’s craving for art that soothes, grounds, and infuses living spaces with calm and joy. By merging classical subjects with a fresh, vivid palette and painterly energy, Haubenstock creates works that feel both comfortably familiar and strikingly alive — bridging past and present, tradition and the evolving needs of the modern viewer. mikehaubenstock.com
Pamela James
Jo Kennedy
Jo is an abstract painter who works in acrylic, mixed media, and collage. Holding an MFA from VCU and a Master of Humanities from University of Richmond, Jo has studied painting in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, the Visual Arts Center of Richmond and with private instructors. Her work can be seen at Stravitz Fine Art Gallery in Virginia Beach. Growing up in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia, I spent much of my childhood in the outdoors where the contours and rhythms of the Blue Ridge Mountains, the fertile valley and the winding Shenandoah River indelibly imprinted my childhood memory and imagination. My paintings are informed by a strong sense of place and my desire to create, define and claim the small physical space of the canvas in relation to the larger canvas of the natural world. While my abstract paintings are not traditional landscapes, I like to think of them as landscapes of the heart and memory.
Website: jokennedyart.com
Email: appletreestudio@yahoo.com
Andrea Lantz
Joan Layne
Bart Levy
Bart Levy works in oils, but also oil pastel, and does some printmaking. She works mostly from her own photos in her studio, as well as some en plein air. She has exhibited in galleries, group shows and solo shows in Virginia and North Carolina. Levy expresses the peacefulness and sometimes austerity of the North Carolina and Virginia rural areas, from the mountains to the wide-open countryside, to the beaches of the coast. Her florals and still life paintings concern shape, color, and light. She records the beauty and simplicity of daily life. Design is a vital aspect of all her paintings. bartlevyart.com
Linda Lewis
Scott Love
Virginia McConnell
Lorraine Meade
Color, texture, line, and form come together piece by piece in the work of mosaic artist Lorraine Meade. From the intricate details in her smallest piece of wearable mosaics to the 40-foot long mosaic wave adorning the walls of the University of Richmond’s Heilman Dining Center, Lorraine’s art reveals curiosity, whimsy, and beauty. Lorraine creates at Heartspace Studios in North Chesterfield and displays her work at Crossroads Art Center. She accepts commissions, teaches group and individual classes, and participates in local shows. mosaiquecreations.com • heartspacestudiosrva.com • facebook.com/mosaiquecreations
Linda Miller
Sandra Nye-Moran
Originally inspired by the scenery near her upstate New York home, “Sandy” grew up drawing; she was a doodler. After studying at New York’s Fashion Institute of Technology she designed children’s clothing, and pursued art classes at Pratt Institute. After moving to Richmond, she took watercolor classes at the Visual Arts Center for five years and had her first show there in 2008. She enjoys studying the science of watercolor because each color reacts differently with other colors and the papers. Moran specializes in painting landscapes and people. The sources of her inspiration range from photos to old memories. She likes capturing a special moment. Moran attended Nimrod art center in Bath County, and the Maine Frederick Church camp summer arts programs. I’m still developing my skills, she explains.
Carl Patow
Carolyn Pitts
Trish Poupore
Trish Poupore enjoys creating portraits and landscapes in oil or oil pastel. She enjoys painting scenes around Richmond, the mountains of Virginia and around the beaches and hammock of Florida.
She enjoys transporting the viewer to times and places of nature, comfort, warmth, nostalgia and hopefulness through light and color. Over the last 15 years she has enjoyed workshops and classes at Nimrod Hall, the Visual Art Center of Richmond, and painting with friends. She exhibits her work and sells cards in the Richmond area. See her portfolio and inquire with her through her website HERE.
Janet Ringle
Janet Ringle is a self-taught artist living in the Richmond area for the past 33 years. Her work consists mostly of abstract works, and she paints primarily in oil, cold wax, oil sticks, acrylics and encaustics.
Over the past 17 years she has attended workshops and classes at the VMFA Studio School, the Visual Art Center of Richmond, and through online academies. She exhibits her work in the Richmond area, as well as online at JanetRingle.com.
Her professional career was in digital marketing and communications. However, as a child of two artists, she has been drawing and painting her entire life.
Janet feels inspiration is unlimited living in RVA. From the river, nearby mountains and beaches, and from the city’s wonderful museums and galleries to its incredible street art, the possibilities are endless.
Janet is the past President of MRAA, and current Technology Chairperson.
Follow Janet on Instagram at @j.lambdin.ringle_art or on her website at JanetRingle.com, or contact her at J.Lambdin.Ringle@gmail.com.
Martha Rogers
Diana Scott-Auger
Returning to her first love after an early retirement from an award-winning journalism career, Diana, whose studio is now in Zion Crossroads, Va., transitioned from oils to acrylics, ironically becoming a slow painter in a fast medium. Whether born of a visceral reaction to the bark of a dying tree or the vicarious thrill of watching a kayaker battle the current, images on her canvases very gradually grow into visual stories through textural brush strokes, glazing, and patient attention to detail. Diana earned a B.A. in art history from Bennington College. She also did graduate study in fine arts at Boston University and took classes at the Art Students League of New York. Her work is in many private collections throughout much of the United States. She is represented by Annie Gould Gallery in historic Gordonsville, VA. dianascottauger.com
N. Blake Seals
N Blake Seals was born in Huntington, NY, attended the School of Visual Arts, in NYC, and currently resides in Virginia. Blake has managed a comic book shop, served in the US Navy Reserve as a Corpsman with the Marines, volunteered as a firefighter/paramedic and works as an organ transplant coordinator. He has also owned and managed world-class recording facilities, shown his artwork in New York City, worked on Marvel and Archie comics, traveled the world as a black belt in Matsubayashi-Ryu Karate-Do and is an award-winning author and graphic designer. Blake’s work is derived from the seemingly disparate disciplines of comic book illustration and abstract mark making, Blake is inspired by city landmarks, pop culture and non-representational work. Blake’s digital paintings typically start as impressionistic drawings, hand-drawn abstract doodles, and painted color fields on paper. Then they are combined, transformed, and manipulated in the computer and output onto various substrates.
Mary Montague Sikes
Although her first official art training did not come until her college days at the University of Mary Washington, painter Mary Montague Sikes says she has always been an artist. From early childhood days in Fredericksburg, Virginia studying cloud formations, she has loved color and dreamed of how it might be used in unusual and exciting ways. At the College of William & Mary, she discovered acrylic paints and fell in love with sculptural form and design. Later, she studied painting and earned an MFA degree at Virginia Commonwealth University. Over the years, every art medium has attracted her attention at some point and brought joy to her West Point studio. Working on both wooden panels and canvas, she currently is experimenting with oil and cold wax as well as anything that brings texture to her work. The delight of intense watercolor on Yupo (a synthetic paper) also intrigues her. She has traveled extensively in the United States, Europe, and the Caribbean and often brings the sights and sounds of exotic places into her work. Sometimes, she paints and writes intuitively which recently resulted in the publication of the book, Spirit Visions Soul Songs. www.marymontaguesikes.com
Alice Simon
Art has fluctuated through Alice Simon’s career; painting has given her both meaning and purpose. She cherishes where she grew up in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia but has called the flat lands of Hanover County home for the majority of her years. She studied with Mort Traylor at the Virginia Art Institute and received her BFA and MIS degrees from VCU. Shehas painted in realism to layered abstracts; her motives for the work may have changed. But her changing has been the need to express in parallel visual terms her thoughts and feelings in new inventive ways. Lines and edges have softened over time inspired by circumstances or the environment of color. Sometimes bold or low tones, other times simple observations have made her canvases come to life. But the unmistakeable sound of the work had to be heard before she declared each piece finished. Her work can be seen in Luray, Virginia at the Warehouse Art Gallery and often at Crossroads Art Gallery in Richmond, Virginia or on her website at simonfineart.com.
David Snellings
David Snellings is from Richmond. He started painting after a 45- year career. Asked to enter the Canadian Wildlife Art Competition is Saskatchewan, he was disqualified! He says the judges felt he was just “seeking awards,” and he feels that properly categorized, he would have been rewarded. He viewed himself as an amateur.
He got serious about wildlife art and made several trips to Yellowstone to stalk bears and wolves and gather material. He has slogged through Hayden Valley (America’s Serengeti) in minus 12-degrees at 3 AM in a foot of snow, a time when wildlife is active.
David has showed his work in Montana, Georgia, and Osaka, Japan. (He says the Atlantic area buys no wildlife art.) He completes challenging landscapes and still-lifes, in acrylics and watercolors. He finds himself drifting
back to wildlife and sells his work out west or in Canada. He hopes his kids will not have to find a way to get rid
of a lot of wildlife art!
Visit David’s website at www.davidsnellings.com.
Kerstin Stiller
Kerstin Stiller is a self-taught artist, mechanical engineer and immigrant. Calling Virginia home for over 19 years, she has exhibited her work since 2019 in a variety of galleries in Richmond, VA.
Born in the former East Germany, she has never received a professional art education; she has a BA in Industrial Design from Magdeburg-Stendal University in Applied Sciences.
Since 2021 she’s studied under Adele Castillo in Richmond, VA, which has helped her define her style and find her love for texture and squares. With acrylic paint and a variety of tools, she’s creates abstract art with layered surfaces that are visually dynamic and vibrant. With her mechanical engineering background, a little bit of structure always sneaks into her work!
website: www.rellitsart.com
Renee Stramel
Renée Stramel is a broad-ranging visual artist with a long commercial career in art publishing. Her abstract work celebrates color and form characterized by a playful, expressive use of geometry. Color plays a central role with bold, contrasting hues creating striking visual effects. Renée works in various media including acrylic, watercolor, digital and analog photography, and digital design. Such brands as Anthropologie, Minted, and Ethan Allen have sold her work.
Recent shows include work at Art Space Gallery and Second Street Gallery.
In 2024, she launched her own line of stationery and art prints.
Originally from Alexandria, VA, Renée has resided in Richmond for 39 years and lives in the Lakeside area with her filmmaker husband Jim Stramel. Inspiration comes from the films of the 1970s and 80s, Mother Nature, and mid-20th century graphic design, she works from her sunny studio creating works for residential and commercial clients.
Edward Tepper
Minh Chau Truong
Keziah Vandalov
Keziah is an emerging young artist who works mostly with figures in oil. She is fascinated by texture and uses palette knife frequently in her paintings, as well as other mediums that make her work stand out from the canvas. With a minor in Studio Art from Randolph-Macon College, which includes a semester of studio classes in Florence, Italy, Keziah continues her growth as an artist under the instruction of Susan Fisher here in Richmond. Most of her work is inspired by photographs taken on her extensive travels abroad and revolves around a captivation with locals in their most raw environment.
Pamela Winegard
Robert Winne
As a life-long sportsman, Robert’s paintings are inspired from his interaction with the outdoors, primarily with the beaches, inlets and marshes along the North Carolina coastline. A graduate of Atlantic Christian College in Wilson, NC with a Graphic Design degree, Robert has served as an Illustrator with the Department of Defense, an adjunct professor teaching Airbrush Illustration at John Tyler Community College and a free-lance Illustrator for Ad agencies and corporate clients throughout Virginia. In 2004, Robert transformed his skills from a structured graphic design professional into an artist creating beautifully crafted abstract paintings. Robert works primarily in Acrylic, Oil and Cold Wax. Robert is represented by Stravitz Fine Art Gallery in Virginia Beach stravitzartgallery.com/ and has a gallery of his works at Crossroads Art Center in Richmond crossroadsartcenter.com/collections/robert-winne
Website: robertwinne.com
Instagram: instagram.com/robertwinnefineart/
Edgar Woodle
Douglas Orr Zeigler
Douglas Orr Zeigler was born in Dixon, Illinois and attended The University of Chicago and The Art Institute of Chicago (BFA). He studied drawing, painting and design with several European emigre faculty who emphasized the traditional disciplines. In this rich environment, he developed an approach to an individual vision which is grounded in representation, but also taps expressive, spontaneous impulses—and yields to immediate responses of color, line, form and texture. Zeigler works from his studio in Manakin Sabot, Virginia. He accepts commissions for a wide variety of artwork. Zeigler states that the visual artist has a responsibility to be faithful to his will to create, to go to those places where his vision takes form by means of paint on canvas or pigmented water on paper. Nature is his starting point, but the subconscious guides his response to what he “knows” or “sees.” His goal as an artist is to enable others to share the beauty and excitement of the creative spirit. zeiglerart.com
MRAA Members: If you would like to appear on this page send 1 jpg image (square format works best) and a 1 paragraph biography (150 words maximum) with a web link to tech@metrorichmondart.org.