ElleCoyote Process

Painting process posts by Ellen McCormick Martens

Monday, September 07, 2020

The small golden tree is the focal point and it stands out now with the addition of the black trunk.

Ellen McCormick Martens: Houston, Texas, United States; I do abstract collage, mostly using paper that I paint and print myself. I also use stencils and my own carved rubber stamps. I grew up in Green Bay, Wisconsin, and decided to be an artist at age 12. I began to paint full-time in 1996, after working as a computer typesetter for 16 years. At first I did a lot of brightly-colored landscapes with flattened shapes and space. I love light through trees, and painted a lot of that subject. You can see some of this work on my older blog, ellenmccormickmartens.blogspot.com. From bright, flat landscapes I moved on to beaded collage portraits of myself and my family, then to geometric zodiac paintings, and on to the abstract collage work I am currently creating. I hope that my spirit comes through my work. I believe that each human being is immortal, incarnated many times, and that we keep learning and perfecting ourselves.