Works by Nancy Crookston that have been sold at Scottsdale Fine Art.

Nancy Seamons Crookston has gained a broad following over the years creating images of women and girls in flowing Old World peasant dress and quiet pastoral settings.  Her paintings evoke the warmth of family and the restfulness of a time less complicated than our own.

Growing up in a small-town in Utah, The daughter of a nurse/poet mother and a schoolteacher father who played a trumpet in a big band, she looks back now and sees a childhood infused with openness and creativity in many forms.  She had a fascination with drawing women even then. Marriage and a family of her own cut her college art days short, but that did not curb her passion for painting.  She would fit short sessions of painting between family duties and by the time her children were grown she had her art in several galleries and international collectors were actively seeking her work.

Besides sheer determination, a significant factor in her career was a series of workshops with renowned Russian-American master painter Sergei Bongart (1918-1985).  Trained in Russia in a strongly academic environment that stressed the fundamentals of drawing and painting, Bongart was an exacting teacher and a sometimes “scary critic”.  Those able to endure his merciless appraisals however, were likely to come away better artists.

She persevered and soon her works were among those chosen by the teacher for a table displaying the paintings considered the best each week.  These workshops, she reflects, were a small part of her life in terms of time but a huge part in their impact.  They helped set her on a path that has led to exhibitions in Japan, a Best of Show award at the Oil Painters of America Show in Carmel, CA and most recently, the honor of being designated a “Master Signature Member” by the OPA group.

Crookston continues to paint largely from life, as her mentor did.  As her emptied nest allows more time for art, she views her work with renewed vigor.  “I’m always learning, and I can’t tell you how thrilling it is when I realize I’m just barely touching the tip of the iceberg,” Crookston says. “I loved being a mom, but I always wanted to paint, and now I’m a full-time painter.  Now the gas pedal is on the floor!”