Marshelle Backes
Marshelle Backes
Acrylic, Oil, Watercolor, and Digital Illustration
I will be showing at a pop up gallery at Aberdeen Art Center – 200 West Market Street, Aberdeen, during the tour.
Drawing and painting since I was a young child, I grew up with a fascination for color and form. During the turbulence of high school, creativity blossomed as art became my solace from bullying and the teenage angst of exclusion.
As a young person, I had a knack for being my own boss. That’s the self-guided artist in me. I owned and operated multiple successful businesses, putting myself through college for first, a Certificate in Business Administration, then an Associate’s Degree in Graphic and Web Design, and finally, a Bachelor’s of Fine Arts in painting.
After college I pursued Graphic Design as a paying artist’s job. At my first post-graduate job, fate dropped web design and programming into my lap. There, as a self taught techy, I focused on technical expertise and honed my skills at being precise. It was the antidote of my sometimes, too creative brain. I had to think logically. Now, I reap the benefits of that.
I retired in 2021 due to a disability. My last position was as a “one-woman-army” – the (entire) web and social media department for the largest commercial vegetable seed company in the world. I single-handedly administrated the international company website and launched their social media program in 11 languages. I am a certified Google Expert in Project Management, SEO, and am a certified Social Media Manager. I think all that education in programming and design, because it is mostly technical, helped to balance my artistic brain with practicality. Both the right and left lobes are (mostly) in sync.
Retiring left me with a lot of free time to go back to my first love, art. I love digital and hand-crafted work and pursue both with vigor.
Thanks to a vibrant and supportive art community here in Gray’s Harbor, my once rusty art skills are coming along nicely! I work in oil, acrylic, guaoche and watercolor. I can’t limit myself to just one art style. I create works in Abstract, Abstract Realism, and Realism.
Spoiler alert, I will be coming out with some digital artwork and coloring books on Amazon.