Aimee Erickson
About The Artist

“Color has emotional weight and is related to the shape of space. Drawing or
painting, for me, means to look at the thing and transmit its vitality to the canvas.”
Aimee Erickson (b. 1967, Paris) is an oil painter living in Portland, Oregon.
She was trained as an illustrator and has developed a warm, inviting pictorial
voice grounded in traditional realism, informed by the principles of design, and
inspired by nature and human experience. She holds a BFA in Visual
Communication Design, and has also studied with a number of prominent
painters including Sherrie McGraw, David Leffel, Burton Silverman, Joseph
Paquet, William Park, Stephen Hayes, and Ray Roberts.
Aimee is the first woman artist to paint an Oregon gubernatorial portrait, that
of Barbara Roberts in 1997. The portrait hangs in the Oregon State House,
upstairs on the legislature side.
Aimee teaches studio and plein-air painting, drawing, and color theory locally
and at venues nationwide. She has a particular interest in what enables or
inhibits our progress as artists. How do we learn to see what we cannot yet see?
How do our beliefs influence our ability to perceive? What is the role of
knowledge in the realm of choice? How do we “tune in” to our artistic
perception?
Aimee’s work has been awarded top prizes in many national competitions,
including Oil Painters of America, American Women Artists, the Portrait
Society of America, and multiple notable plein air competitions.
Honors and awards:
2017 Best of Show and Museum Purchase Award, Pacific Northwest Plein Air
2017 Best of Show and Clyde Aspevig Judge's Choice Awards, Olmsted Plein Air
2017 Door County Plein Air
2017 "Six by Nine Sale," Portrait Society of America invitational show
2017 Oil Painters of America National Juried Exhibition
2017 Oil Painters of America Paint-out/paint-in, 6th place
2016 Laguna Beach Plein Air Invitational
2016 Second Place & Best Water, Pacific Northwest Plein Air
2016 Best of Show, Just Plein Fun, Balboa Island, California
2016 End-of-Residency Solo Exhibition, University Club of Portland
2016 Still Life Honorable Mention, OPA National Exhibition, Dallas TX
2016 5th Place, OPA's Best Little Paint-out in Texas
2016 University Club of Portland Artist-in-Residence Alumni Showcase
2016 Mid-Residency Solo Show, University Club of Portland
2016 "All Along the Sierra" Juried Show at Epperson Gallery
2016 "Less is More" LPAPA at Forest & Ocean Gallery
2015 "Inspired by Sorolla" LPAPA at Forest & Ocean Gallery
2015 "LPAPA After Dark," Forest & Ocean Gallery
2015 "Recent Paintings" solo show at Brian Marki Fine Art
2015 "Instructors' Show" Multnomah Arts Center
2015 Strada Award, Laguna Beach Plein Air
2015 OPA National Exhibition, Cutter & Cutter Fine Art, St. Augustine FL
2015 Sonoma Plein Air
2015 Mendocino Open Paint Out, Celebrity Guest Artist
2015 Door County Plein Air
2015 OPA Western Regional Exhibition
2015 "Where in the World is Plein Air" online national paint-out
2015 "Six by Nine Sale," Portrait Society of America invitational show
2015 "Everyday Taste of Plein Air" invitational show, Giustina Gallery at OSU
2015 Best QuickDraw and Honorable Mention, Carmel Art Festival
2015 "Aimee Erickson and Wayne McKenzie" at Nancy Dodds Gallery
2015 Honorable Mention, Kern County Plein Air
2014 Award of Excellence for Portraiture, Oil Painters of America National Juried
Exhibition
2014 Award of Exceptional Merit, Portrait Society of America International Art of the
Portrait Competition
2014 Gold Medal, First Annual International Juried Artists Guild Exhibition2014
Best of Show, American Women Artists national juried show
2014 Artists’ Choice/Best of Show, Sonoma Plein Air
2014 Award of Excellence for Portraiture, Oil Painters of America
2014 Award of Exceptional Merit, Portrait Society of America International Art of the
Portrait
2014 Gold Medal for Portraiture, First Annual Artists’ Guild International Exhibition
2014 First Place, Carmel Art Festival
2014 First Place, Emerging Plein-Air Artists competition
2014 Second Place, Pacific Northwest Plein Air
2013 Best Two-Dimensional Work, American Women Artists national juried show
2013 First Place, Pacific Northwest Plein Air
2013 First Place, First Annual Eugene Paint-out
2013 First Place, Honorable Mention, and People's Choice Award, Carmel Art Festival
Education:
BFA, Visual Communication Design. Brigham Young University, 1991
Additional studies with Sherrie McGraw, Burton Silverman, and David Leffel; with
Richard Pionk at the Art Students League of New York; and plein-air landscape
painting with Joseph Paquet at the Florence Academy of Art
Organizations:
Salmagundi Club, NY.
Laguna Plein Air Painters Association, CA. (signature member)
Oil Painters of America. (signature member)
American Impressionist Society
Audubon Artists, NYC
American Women Artists
Portrait Society of America