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Art: In Touch with Nature

Artist Stephanie Paige's career is blooming

By Erin Meanley Glenny

From her Ramona home studio, artist Stephanie Paige has a front-row seat to all kinds of nature, including wild turkeys and deer roaming through the valley below. It’s no wonder that she uses a lot of the nearby foliage in her work, such as eucalyptus branches plucked from her yard.

She begins with a birchwood panel and adds layers of textured marble dust plaster, which she later sands, burnishes, and polishes. One layer takes three days to a week to dry, meaning each piece is four to six weeks in the making. “This process teaches me patience and is very meditative for me,” she says. Her most important ingredient is positive energy. “I only create when my energy is in a loving, centered place.”

This month, Symmetry of Nature, her exhibition at Contemporary Fine Arts Gallery in La Jolla, will showcase more than 20 pieces from her new Garden series and Peaceful Ocean series.

Paige has a long history with the gallery’s owner, Lisa Jacobson, whom she says supports each of her artists and helps them with their careers. When Jacobson found Paige, she was selling well at Mixture in Little Italy. “I’d dreamed of being in this gallery,” she says. “I could not believe she would give me a chance. In San Diego, it is rare to find a gallery that not only stays in business for many years but also invests in its artists.” Since joining CFA, Paige has been picked up by galleries in other states and, within California, her sales have tripled in the past two years.

Watch her work fly off the shelves—er, walls—at Symmetry of Nature, May 2 through May 29 at Contemporary Fine Arts Gallery, 7946 Ivanhoe Ave, La Jolla.

Art: In Touch with Nature

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