Marguerite Lyons
Career Narrative

Creativity and art have always been a part of my life.  Luckily my family continually visited museums and enjoyed artful activities.

I have studied art at UCLA, State University of New York, Albany, College of Saint Rose, New York, and Art New England at Bennington College, Vermont.  When I lived in Vermont I had access to the art activities of New York City and Boston.  My love and dedicatiion to watercolor painting emerged after studying for two summers with noted artists Sondra Freckleton and Jack Beal in upstate New York.

The classes enriched my experience, broadened my knowledge and forced me to experiment thoroughly with color, line, shape, materials, compositon and subject matter.  The continuing academic experiences convinced me that art was to shape my future and to become my passion.

I entered my first group art show at Springfield Museum of Art in Massachusetts where I earned an honorable mention award and my first one-person show took place in 1994 at Chaffee Art Center in Rutland, Vermont.  Since thenb, I have exhibited in more than 60 group art shows and 18 one-woman shows throughout the United States.

I have been elected to the Salmagundi Club of New York City, the National Art League, the National Association of Women Artists and the American Artists Professional League, Inc., New York City.  I have earned signature membership in ten art societies and have been named a fellow of the American Artists Professional League, Inc.

I was a resident at the Julia and David White Artists Colony in Costa Rica in 2004.  My work also was selected to be part of the Art in Embassies Program of the US State Department in 2003.  The Milburn Foundation asked me to be one of their artists in Mexico in 2003.  In addition, slides of my work were shown at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City for induction into the National Association of Women Artists, Inc. in 1998.

Articles on my work and/or photos of my paintings were published in 2004 Arts for the Parks, "Artists Celebrating Our National Parks," National Park Academy of Artists, Inc.; in San Luis Obispo Magazine, 2003, 2000 and 1999; Five Cities Time Press Recorder, Santa Maria, CA, 1998; and the Rutland Daily Herald, Rutland, VT., 1994.

I have been teaching painting classes for more than 25 years.  I also have conducted painting workshops for art associations and private art facilities throughout the West.