Marie Theron

?The various forms which are available to the artist: the elusive dynamics of exaggeration, balance, colour and design guide the characteristics of my style. Of all these, colour rules supreme in my work. I am influenced by everyday images that radiate bold colours: for instance pumpkins, apples, pomegranates, brightly painted fishermen?s' boats, ladies dressed in a maddening clash of colourful garments, carousel horses in reds, blues and purple jewel colours. My mission is to create ?happy? and peaceful works to share with and influence the mood of the spectator.? Curriculum Vitae Marie qualified as an art teacher in 1964 at Pretoria Teacher?s College and continued her studies in fine arts and history of art at the University of South Africa. Since then she has taught art and lectured at the Bellville Art Centre in Cape Town and is a full time artist living in Cape Town. She excels in watercolours and is known for her work in botanical and book illustrations as well as stationery design. Since 1994 she has expressed herself in oils and acrylics on canvas. A great number of her commissioned works are to be seen in corporate offices, guesthouses, libraries, clinics and private homes in South Africa. She has also sold works in Houston, Texas and in South Carolina, England, Ireland, Hungary, Croatia, France, Germany, Canada and Australia. The artist has several paintings in the permanent collection of the South African Embassy in Budapest and at the Academia Cravatica in Zagreb. Her themes, which have proven most popular, include South African West Coast seascapes depicting the indigenous lifestyle of its people, the slow pace and peaceful existence of that area. Her still life compositions depict colourful pumpkins and fruit that portray the abundance synonymous with the Cape of Good Hope. All these forms are bold, rich in colour, and exaggerated to express the light and colour of the Western Cape.