Diana Ahrens
Mixed Media
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Diana’s work has an uplifting appeal to many people. Her brilliant colors and unique artistic technique have awarded her distinction as a truly innovative artist and her work has been seen in the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York and has been sold across the country and internationally.She began her artistic career in 1979 painting aerial photography in Toledo, Ohio. Later, in 1991, she apprenticed as a stain glass artist at Cristallo Glass Studio in Toledo. After her apprenticeship there, she studied with a 5th generation glass master from Germany. She designed and built custom stain glass windows and other works, both original and antique while at the Cristallo Studio. In 1994 Diana created a glass mosaic dining tabletop for the Andy Warhol "Art for Campbell Soup" contest. Diana’s piece was later displayed in the Whitney.
For fourteen years she and her husband worked from their studio in Northern Nevada, attending art events in Arizona, California, Nevada, Oregon, and Washington. In the summer of 2010 she and her husband relocated to Northwest Georgia where her studio is presently located. She currently shows her work at art events in the Midwest and Eastern United States. Her work can also be found in wineries in Napa/Sonoma, Palm Springs, CA and Jerome, AZ.
Over many years, Diana has created her unique mixed media technique which has been an evolution from high-end stained glass work, glass mosaic design, kiln work, and painting in fine acrylics, hand-rolled pastels, and metal leaf. Each piece is an expression of her sense of fun, romance, and her passion in wine, florals, and other libations. Her original paintings all start on canvas. Her rich impasto textures are layer upon layer of her own custom mixes of fine acrylics, hand-rolled pastels, and metal leaf with different mediums. She will alternate layers of acrylic, pastel, and metal leaf depending on the piece. In the finish layer, Diana draws on her experience with stained glass, mosaic design, and kiln formed glass. This is the layer that gives the dimensional aspect to the piece and consists of hand-cut kiln formed glass, dichroic glass, and other embellishments.