 Nicolaysen Art Museum and Discovery Center, Casper, Wy
"Impressions of India - A Kaleidoscope of Scenes"
One Man show - May 30 - August 2, 1998
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Educational Background:
B.S. Stephen F. Austin, Nacogdoches, TX
M.A. Texas Women's University, Denton, TX
Post Graduate work at Columbia University and other colleges
Professional Background:
Teacher of Public School Art, all levels, Texas
Teacher of Watercolor Painting, Casper College,
Nicolaysen Art Museum School of Art, and the Casper Recreation Center, all of Casper, WY
Member Casper Artists Guild, Wyoming Art Association, and Wyoming Watercolor Society
One Person Exhibits:
Nicolaysen Art Museum, Casper, WY - 1998 - "Impressions of India" also 1984
Westwind Gallery - 1995 - Casper, WY - "Japan Today"
Also 1993 and 1986
Meadowlark Gallery, Douglas WY - 1993
Community Fine Arts Center, Rock Springs, WY - 1989
The Dahl Fine Arts Center - Rapid City, South Dakota - June 1987
Smith Gallery, Gillette, WY - 1983
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Joint Exhibitions:
Annual dinner & Art Auction - The NIC. 1992, 1993
4th Wyoming Invitational Show - Nicolaysen Art Museum Sept 1987
Wyoming State Art Museum Retrospective Exhibit, Cheyenne, WY 1986
Permanent Collections:
Pioneer Memorial Museum, Douglas, WY
Wyoming State Art Museum, Cheyenne, WY
Natrona County Library, Casper, WY
Williams, Porter, Day & Neville, P.C. Attorneys, and other business and private collections
Juried Regional and National Shows:
ART WYO, Nat. Show, 1985-2000 each year (also prior years)
Wyoming Watercolor Society Shows 1985, 1987-2000 each year
Watercolor West - Missoula Museum of Arts 1986
Wyoming, The Cowboy State Traveling Show 1986-87
Central Wyoming College Art Exhibition, Riverton, WY 1985-1986 each year
Western Regional Art Show & Sale, Old West Museum, Cheyenne, WY 1984-1987 each year
Cheyenne Regional Wildlife Show 1985
Publications:
Book Cover, Emerald Elephant by Ann Gastafson Frake, 1997
Watercolor Magic Magazine, Jan 2001 Featuring WyWS and "The Flute Seller" 1st Place Winner, 6/2000
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Biography continued from Home page. . . My husband taught in the community college and I in the public schools in Baytown, Texas, when we felt God was calling us to go into the home missions field of our church. In 1971, we moved to Casper Wyoming to pastor the small United Pentecostal church there. We were soon both teaching in the community college in Casper. He taught welding and metallurgy and I taught watercolor painting. In the mid 80's we both retired from the college, but I continued to teach watercolor workshops, first in the Nicolaysen Museum School of Art, then at the Casper Recreation Center.
 My husband passed away in 1989. In 1993, I accepted an invitation to teach in an English medium College in New Delhi India. Among other subjects, I teach keyboard, choir, voice production, and watercolor painting. Music and art instruction is not readily available in the schools in India.
I have traveled extensively in India and Nepal. It was the natural thing to do to paint about my experiences in India. I fly out to New Delhi this November.
 "Impressions of India, a Kaleidoscope of Scenes" opened at the Nicolaysen Art Museum, a showing of 38 watercolor paintings of India, May 30 to August 1, 1998. This exhibit has been moved to various galleries since then. I have also entered individual paintings in various national shows.
At the same time, I continue to paint about India, and now Nepal, as well as the usual Rocky Mountain Scenes, florals, and vintage architectural subjects I have always loved to do.
I was born an only child to Doctor and Mrs Boyce Bateman, in Joplin Missouri. My father was an optomotrist, my mother a housewife; however, my mother was a talented dress designer, having studied with Madam Meck in San Antonio before she married my father.
When I exhibited an interest in piano, she gave me private lessons. I had my first recital when I was five years old. At the same time, I was drawing everything that interested me. My mother found a private art teacher for me. In those days, there was no music or art taught in the schools. I received music instruction until I graduated from college.
My art training was less structured, but I always received encouragement and whatever art materials I wanted. When I graduated from high school, I was given an art medal, because I illustrated my projects and writings and did art works as needed for the school.
It was natural that I should major in music and art in acquiring my Bachelors Degree from Stephan F. Austin in Nacogdoches, Texas. I began teaching music at the age of 20 in Anahuac Texas. Two years later, I went to teach art in an elementary school in Conroe, Texas.
I have always preferred to teach art in the public schools. I believe it is one subject, which can actually teach creative thinking and problem solving skills to children, when taught as I thought it should be. I taught 14 years at the junior high level.
At the age of 41, I married James Creel, a friend whose wife had died of Cancer. I became a stepmother to 3teenagers; the older daughter had recently married. Almost two years later, our son was born. He became the much loved little brother of the family, and I, his mother, had to stand in line to hold him.
These were good children, and with my experience teaching teenagers, I was comfortable with them. Our family developed a close relationship which continues to this day.
When asked to explain why I paint, I usually answer, because I see subjects that I feel compelled to paint. As a child, I never wondered why I drew, except that so many things simply demanded that I draw them. I have never thought much about "Talent" or looked for a quality I could call "talent".
We are all creative beings, if that creativity is not stifled in our growing up. The need to express ones feelings about life is universal, and some kind of language is needed for that expression. There are art skills, which make up a visual language. The urge to express oneself visually demands that we acquire a language (art skills) so we can express our responses to whatever life experiences we have. It is possible for a person with only minimal language skills to express profound things. It is also possible to have a mastery of language skills and very little of importance to say. A profound idea spoken eloquently, skillfully, is admirable and well worth continued effort to accomplish.
An early art educator determined that people expressed themselves artistically in various ways. He used two terms to describe two extreme types of art expressions, Visuals, and Hapticals. Those children he dubbed "Haptical" reacted subjectively rather than visually to their subjects. To them, linear and atmospherical perspectives are not "real". That distant telephone pole is not smaller than this one. That distant mountain is not blue as it appears, but is green and brown as rocks and trees "are." Their work generally is two dimensional, and exaggeration often indicates importance of objects in their pictures. Some of their pictures are purely abstract.
At the other extreme, he identified children who drew and painted as they saw visually. True, linear perspective is a visual phenomenon, but it is "real" to the visually inclined child or artist. Visually inclined artists continue to paint realistic pictures, and a visually oriented public still buys paintings they like. This takes nothing from the many fine abstract and subjective artists around today. Art continues to "speak" to everyone. It is the one universal language. . .
I would like to close by saying it is always difficult to express verbally what one feels should be expressed visually. Let it be sufficient to say, the art experience should be for everyone, and we will let the future generation determine who is talented. Meanwhile we will enjoy the ability to speak visually as well as verbally experiencing life to the fullest and sharing those experiences freely. Have I convinced you that you should take up painting? Go ahead! It's one of life's great pleasures!
Sincerely,
Anniedeen Creel
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