“I
don’t have a story – I’m just a painter,” announces Alice Weil seated a
bit uncomfortably – thanks to the presence of a persistent photographer
– in her light-filled Menlo Park studio.
But then the stories
start coming. About moving to the hills of the Peninsula as a child and
being transfixed by the smell of turpentine and oil emanating from a
neighbor’s studio. About marrying her Woodside High School classmate
even though she didn’t know him when they were in school (they met
eight years later). About the kind of music she paints t0 – make that
country and western and reggae. “Classical is too unsettling to me,”
she says.
Alice
is an oil painter, mainly of landscapes. “What I really love is a
distant view,” she says. “I love to gaze – I’m dangerous on 280.”
If
she doesn’t actually make a living as an artist, sales are steady, and,
as she puts it, “it pays for my habit.” She wins awards, most recently
“Best in Show” of the Menlo Art League. Her California landscapes also
make their way out of the state; currently she has 15 paintings at a
gallery in Downer’s Grove, Illinois.
If it was the smell of an
artist’s studio that first drew Alice to her medium, it’s one that
she’s trying to leave behind. “I’m trying to ban turpentine and as many
toxic products as possible from my studio, ” she says. “I’m doing this
for my own health as well as the environment. The oil paint itself
isn’t great but I can’t do much about that.
“I use baby oil to clean my brushes and orange-based varnish as a medium. My studio smells like babies and oranges! I love it.”
Summer Golden Hills, Oil on Canvas by Alice Weil (c) 2010. Used with permission.
Brief Biography
I was born in San
Francisco, California. When I was two years old, my family moved to the
rural hills of Redwood City, California. I was exposed to art and inspired at
a very early age by a close family friend. He was a neighbor and plein air painter. "To this day the smell of turpentine, linseed oil and paint
sweeps me back to that studio in the hills, filled with easels, paintings of
the California landscape and a kind old painter".
This painter finds peace painting under the shade of mighty oaks as they
grace the golden hills around the San Francisco Bay Area. My paintings reflect the power and strength of the bay area landscape, omitting
the hand of man in most of my paintings.I'm is inspired by the fog laden coastal range and the dramatic seasonal changes of the surrounding foothills. My goal is to take the viewer to a quiet relaxed
place.
I enrolled in art classes throughout
high school and college. Recently studied with The California Academy of
Painters.
I'm a member of Oil Painters of America, The
Los Gatos Art Association, The Society of Western Artists and Bay Area Contemporary Plein Air Circle (BACPAC).
I have participated in many group and
one person shows, receiving numerous awards, including "Best of Show".
My paintings are in private collections throughout
the United States, Canada, and Europe.
A collection of my work can be seen at The Portola Art Gallery , The Allied Arts Guild,
75 Arbor Rd. Menlo Park, CA
