Debra Rushfeldt Studio Gallery

BIOGRAPHY

Debra Rushfeldt was born in Calgary Alberta, and received her art education at ACAD, and the Banff Center. Her art practice spans several decades, and creative evolutions. Currently, her work delves into magic realism with a focus on the natural world, and painting fanciful narratives about the creatures who live there. She has been a full time resident of Nakusp BC since 2002, where she maintains her art practice, and enjoys her
quiet small town life on the Arrow Lakes.

Debra applies traditional painting with a saturated, earthy palette, and a high level of detail to create a recognizable but also a psychedelic world, for her current muse, the western toad to inhabit. Here is where a cast of small creatures enter and leave, and unusual stories take place. Her most recent and ongoing series of acrylic paintings are inspired by her years of curating and coordinating a festival art gallery at the long running Shambhala Music Festival, and celebrates Rave Culture with affection and humor. This narrative focuses on a toad (Esso the Steampunk Toad) and a grasshopper (Mr. Grasshole) who are transformed by their encounter with a mysterious Magic Basket in the forest. Each new painting builds on the story of the previous painting, in which themes of memory, and reality altering choices are explored, and boundaries are dissolved. Debra’s unique painting style is meant to evoke a sense of connection, beauty and wonderment at the complexity of the natural world.

SOME NOTABLE ACHIEVEMENTS (last 10 years)

Curator and coordinator / BASScamp Gallery/ 2017-2025
Featured on PBS “Northwest Profiles”
Received 2 Columbia Basin Trust Major Project Awards
Created and painted a 25’X10” public mural of a western toad for the Village of Nakusp
3 solo shows in A category public galleries