Biography - Julie Petro
Julie's first exposure to art, as a very young girl, was her mother's extensive art book collection, which she spent endless hours poring over with voracious enthusiasm. Most often her attention landed on the great portrait and figure painters such as Rembrandt, Ilya Repin, John Singer Sargent, Cecilia Beaux, and Diego Velázquez. Even then she knew she wanted to be an artist, and was encouraged early on by a natural ability to capture the likeness of whatever she drew.
Her formal study of art began in grade school and continued through her childhood and teenage years, through a brief career as an Army linguist living in Korea, and an even longer one as a graphic designer for a research laboratory in Boulder Colorado. Though she earned her BFA in painting from Arizona State University she considers painting education to be a lifelong endeavor and continues to study with notable artists, including fellow Coloradans Ron Hicks, Quang Ho and Jeff Legg.
Though Julie has always considered herself as an artist of the realist tradition, her brushwork is infused with an impressionist affection that invites the viewer to knit together the forms she has painted to create their own experience of the painting. Her work is in private collections all over the United States and Europe.