Founder of the Pastel Society of North Carolina
website: loriecallahan.com
email: callahanstudio@mindspring.com
Founder & First Elected President of the Pastel Society of North Carolina. Lorie Callahan, accomplished painter and successful painting instructor has been drawing and painting since early childhood. She has taught pastel painting for over 25 years. Lorie’s formal art training began at the University of Massachusetts Amherst followed by the study of Advanced Painting at the Munson-William Proctor Art Institute in Utica, NY and Advanced Painting at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill. Pastel painting in portraiture instruction was taken with Daniel E. Greene, plein-air instruction with Alan Flattman and additional portrait instruction with Richard Pionk and Michael Del Priore. Museum copy work in oils was studied with Frank Covino. Study of master painters Bougeureau, Vermeer, Corot, Monet, Degas, Winslow Homer and many others has inspired Lorie’s love of painting and joy of teaching.
From my earliest memories, painting has been an important part of my life. My visual experience of color flowing into harmony with its many hues and value has always mesmerized me. When I paint the process becomes all consuming to the point that when the painting is finished it takes me a while to fully comprehend that my interaction with it is now over and it is time to let the painting go. I can do this without regret because I know that every painting I have ever created remains a part of me. It is at this point that I realize I am free to begin the process again.
