I create acrylic paintings and encaustic/mixed-media pieces deeply rooted in my home province of Saskatchewan. My work celebrates the prairie landscape, focusing on both macro and micro views of Saskatchewan. The macro landscapes include our living skies, prairie vistas, and country roads, while the micro landscapes are found in gardens, ditches, and flowerbeds—subtle and often overlooked miniature vistas in our backyards and farmyards.
From acrylic and oil painting to encaustic and mixed media, the process of making art fascinates and engages me completely. My encaustic paintings are created with beeswax, damar resin (a natural tree sap that acts as a hardening agent), oil paint, and other media. I work in layers, fusing each one with heat. Encaustic allows me to explore a diverse range of media, embracing the beauty of surface texture, line, color, and transparency.
Working almost exclusively from my own photographs, I spend a significant part of my process trekking in search of images, building a reference library. My most successful pieces are those I see through my camera lens, knowing they will flow seamlessly into successful paintings.
A little bit about my process
Diane Larouche Ellard 