About the Artist
 
Nell Curtis Tilton is a native New Orleanian.  Since high school she has studied oil, drawing and watercolor under many excellent local and internationally known artists.  As a college student, she studied Fine Arts at Mount Vernon College and Newcomb College.
 
While residing in Germany for three years with her husband, she studied oil painting and watercolor, and she successfully exhibited and sold her work there, where she still has a loyal following.  Her work is in many private collections.
 
Artist’s Statement
 
Movement, colors, shapes, pattern, line, and textures - these are some of the elements of art that I find exciting.  I paint for the sheer joy – the passion of it.  Images taken from every day life are translated into visual descriptions on the canvas with the challenges of working out relationships between the elements into a successful composition.  Creating, communicating, experimenting and placing oneself into the work, by putting paint to the surface with emotion, is the connection for me.
 
The Rivergate Series represents a homage to my late father who was an architect – a very creative, gentle, and distinctive man who was a visual artist and produced powerful images with his buildings. One such structure was the award winning Rivergate Convention and Exhibition Center in New Orleans, an innovative design with its sweeping undulating roofline, and contemporary sleek interior with vast un-columned spaces. Regretfully, the Rivergate was destroyed less than 30 years after being built to make way for a gambling casino.

My son who is a music composer inspired the Music Series. The group of paintings was also motivated by the way I relate music to art. Music and art are intertwined in that they both have the same fundamentals that make up the picture/composition. Both arts invite the senses, can evoke every kind of emotion, can induce captivating attention and are capable of having many layers of textures and depth.  

Education/Organizations

1966 A.A., Mount Vernon Junior College, Washington, D.C.
1966-67 Newcomb College, New Orleans, LA
Extended study at the New Orleans Academy of Fine Arts, New Orleans, LA
 
Studied Fine Arts in college and with many excellent local artists, as well as participated in Workshops with nationally and internationally-known artists such as, Katalin Gergo, Alex Powers, Jean Dobie, Lauren Zarambo, Tony Couch, Robert McCoy, Marilyn Hughey Phyllis, Cheng Khee Chee, Allison Stewart, and Katherine Chang Liu, Master Printer Craig O’Brien and John T. Scott. Member of Louisiana Watercolor Society, Arts Council of New Orleans, Contemporary Arts Center, St. Tammany Art Association.

Teaching and Professional Experience
 
Instructor of “Abstract and Experimental Art” at the New Orleans Academy of Fine Arts

2003, 2004, The Colony at Country Day, Metairie, LA, Week-long workshop for adults, Instructor of Abstract Art
 
1995, painted designs for the Tabasco line for Wembly Tie Company
 
1993, 1995, Celebration of the Arts Festival, Academy of the Sacred Heart, as participating artist demonstrating work to students