“I paint what was missing.”

I create art for myself. Art is a form of therapy that I use to heal from the scars left by society. I paint what was missing. As an artist, I tell the stories of the forgotten, the hidden, and what should have been.

Much of my inspiration comes from photographs I find, often of long-forgotten people who no longer have names. I recreate these images, allowing these individuals to return and continue their stories.

The mediums I use in my paintings are encaustic wax and gouache.

Although my educational and professional background has been in business management, I have always felt the call to create. Deep down, I knew I would have an artistic journey, but it took years before I discovered what that journey would be.

I began with fused glass and have worked in the medium for more than a decade. I started working with encaustic wax as a mixed-media medium simply because I saw encaustic works in galleries and wanted to understand how they were created. Reading and online videos became my teachers. I took the plunge, experimented, and simply played. Before I knew it, I was being asked to teach classes and was selling my encaustic mixed-media creations.

Painting came later. I had always wanted to paint but had never picked up a brush. Then the COVID-19 pandemic hit. When the world closed, I knew I needed to find something to calm my soul. I challenged myself to learn to paint. I wanted to create something personal and meaningful, something that reflected my own life and the challenges I had faced.

I decided to create the representation I had missed growing up. I imagined a world where the LGBTQ+ community was represented positively, where the male form could be appreciated without shame, and where people could simply exist as themselves.

Because I already felt comfortable working with wax, I chose encaustic wax as my painting medium. Over the following year, I painted 100 portraits, mostly of men. The inspiration for these paintings came from photographs I found online, often images of people whose names and stories had been forgotten. Through painting, I began to give these images new life and a new story.

From this, a true artistic journey emerged. I painted what I felt I needed to paint. I painted what my soul told me to paint.

After encaustic wax, I began working with watercolor before eventually settling on gouache. I love the luminous, vibrant colors of both encaustic wax and gouache and the way they elevate and strengthen the stories I want to tell.

I am self-taught, with no formal artistic training. I have learned by exploring, experimenting, and allowing myself to play. For me, the key to making art is to have no fear—just create.

Keller