Ellen Hopkins Fountain

After receiving my BFA from Carnegie Mellon, I began working in Pittsburgh - in Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood, at the Public Theater, on George Romero films. Working as a scenic artist, I painted my way from Sesame Street to the Santa Fe Opera. Later, when I began a family, I settled on a smaller scale of painting and began working in watercolor.

Watercolor can be a notoriously fickle medium, but it is just that challenge that I find intriguing.  The  properties of watercolor allow you to paint from the sheerest translucence to the richest darks.  I like pushing those edges, and find watercolor fitting for capturing the light at the beginning and the end of the day.  I work to  crystallize those moments in my landscape paintings.  I continue to paint to celebrate those mysteries of the light and beauty in nature.