I favor Plein Air painting. Oil paint, to me, is as fluid as the landscape. The hours spent outdoors can be invigorating and free of many distractions. Besides the absolute beauty of Marin county there are so many inspiring Plein Air artist to learn from. Bringing the outdoors inside through art can have such a calming effect on the emotions.

 

Gail Galli as born in Massena, New York. Yet has have never seen it; since her parents left there immediately after her birth. After that the family lived to three other states, some more than once, and Sydney, Australia. Gail attended a total of eight schools. Being an only child, and always moving locations, she spent a great deal of time on her own and creative endeavors occupied her interest and time. Interior Design was a nature direction for a major at the University of Oregon.

 

Her experience with drawing and painting began while studying Interior Design at university. Being able transfer your design ideas to paper for illustrating your ideas to clients was a necessity. Subsequently, she pursued a career in commercial Interior Design with several architectural firms in San Francisco, with a brief experiment as an Art Consultant.

 

Living in the San Francisco Bay Area for her adult life gave her an amazing appreciation for the local landscape. One day while sitting on a hillside and staring at the opposite hillside Gail noticed that the entire scene was green. Yet you could distinguish each tree and bush from its neighbor. At that moment she decided she wanted to be able to capture that scene. This led to experimentation with sketching, work in pastels, acrylic and oil paints, printmaking and collage assembly. She has been greatly influenced and inspired by local artists such as Bruce Katz, Tim Horn, Christin Coy and Richard Lindenberg. She would say that she is somewhat self taught with augmented training from the College of Marin with instructors such as Chester Arnold. This also included participating in multiple workshops each year, including a trip to Cuba with 29 other artist and a drawing class in Rome through the California College of the Arts.

 

Gail loves color. After a career as a commercial interior designer she still wishes to be involved with color choices and combinations. She says that she will struggle her entire life with color values and subtlety. Yet constantly enjoying the challenge.

 

At a previous figure drawing class the instructor introduced the idea of representing the human figure with an assemblage of scrape papers. The Covid 19 pandemic brought about a shift and expanse in her interest and she took up the art of collage work. Gail loves seeing how little is required to portray an image of the human figure. She bases her designs on simplified forms and shapes, primarily accented with light and shadow. One cannot paint outside everyday, even in California, so collage work is a perfect alternate.