Artist Profile - Kimberly Sheldon Scruggs

Kimberly Sheldon Scruggs:
A Love for Italy
By Heike Hellmann-Brown

Oil painter Kimberly Sheldon Scruggs credits travelling and photography as inspirations for her vividly colored paintings. I have been to Italy many times, with Venice being my favorite destination, the artist says. The architecture, the landscape, the water, and, most of all, the colors provide endless inspiration.

It was her fascination with colors that brought Kimberly Sheldon Scruggs to creating art in the first place. During the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, there was an exhibition in the High Museum called Rings: Five Passions in World Art. I was amazed by what the artists achieved using different colors. So, I started to look into art classes. With a mom who paints and a dad who does wood-working, including wood duck decoys, Scruggs already had been exposed to the creation of art pieces, but she never studied art before taking a class on the techniques of the old masters.

Many years later, Scruggs still attends those classes weekly. With a full-time job as project manager for Hewlett-Packard, those classes provide me with a dedicated space and time to paint, she explains. I receive advice when needed and merge the techniques Ive learned with my own approach to an art piece.

Scruggs style is reminiscent of impressionists Claude Monet, Edgar Degas and douard Manet, with a more realistic component. The portraits of John Singer Sargent are also a great inspiration to her. While I like the color schemes of the impressionists, I prefer a sense of realism, she says. Scruggs paints portraits, landscapes, animals and local scenes, mostly using her own photographs for reference. Photography has become more and more important to me to get ideas for my paintings. Apart from oil, she occasionally paints in pastels, charcoals, and pencils as well.

Since 2012, Kimberly Sheldon Scruggs has served as president of the Alpha Arts Guild in Alpharetta, a position that allows her to apply her business skills to the art world. The guild is a collaboration of a group of very talented and supportive artists who are contributing to the common cause of promoting the arts. We showcase our work on a regular basis in select venues, and I see such a potential and so many opportunities for us to grow as an organization, she says.

Scruggs artwork will be displayed at the Alpha Arts Guilds member exhibit at the Somerby Retirement Community in Alpharetta until April 11. Her paintings of Portofino and Venice are on display through May at Firefly Kitchen & Bar on Windward Parkway. Scruggs is also available for commissions.

Facebook.com/KimberlySheldonScruggs