"Nurturing Soul"
by Myrna Zanetell
Art of the West • May/June 2005
Like the highly charged air in a lightening storm, the atmosphere surrounding Colorado artist Carole Cooke literally crackles with excitement whenever she talks about personal vision and commitment behind her conservationist spirit of an artist who sees her evocative images as a tangible way to keep viewers connected to nature rather than merely as lovely landscapes whose primary value lies in their aesthetic. That energy is generated by the dedicated appeal.
Although Cooke agrees that today’s plein air artists have an important role to play in documenting the physical beauty of an area, her motivation goes beyond simply recording what she sees. “With our rapidly expanding technology, people need a place to come back to that nurtures their souls,” she says. “Knowing this, I want my paintings to be a force that not only makes people aware of what they are losing but that also inspires them to take an active interest in caring for and about the natural environment so that we can save as much unspoiled wilderness as possible for generations yet to come.”
That passion to preserve open spaces is a natural outgrowth of Cooke’s childhood experiences along the once serene California coast. Born and Raised in Yorba Linda, she always has been most at home among the wonders of nature. As a child, she spent large portions of her days riding horseback along gently rolling foothills forested with oak and sycamore. I remember valleys filled with orange and avocado groves,” she says. “Now the same land is smothered with homes, and open spaces are only a memory.”
Three years ago, Cooke became so disenchanted with conditions in Southern California that she knew it was time for a change. “It was just getting too difficult to find quiet spots to paint,” she says. ‘No parking’ and ‘no stopping’ signs were everywhere and one morning, when I pulled off the side of a road to set up my easel, a man actually threatened to call the police.”
After checking out locations in Wyoming and Montana, Cooke found her way to western Colorado. “I took one look at the snow-capped San Juan Mountains and said, “This is it,” she recalls.
Cooke purchased a home on three acres of land near Pagosa Springs, which she named Stepping Stone Ranch. “We have additional land on the other side of ton where we hope to build some day, but for now the pristine vistas are a way for me to hold onto my dreams,” she says.
In addition to enjoying the freedom of small town living, Cooke is thoroughly enthralled with Colorado’s seasonal changes. “I love the fall colors and the way the snow banks up along the creeks in winter,” she says. “There is a painting everywhere you look.”
Explaining that plein air work is an energized race with the vanishing light, Cooke confides that she often is amazed by the spontaneity of her small studies. “As I work, elements are constantly calling out, ‘Look at me; look at me,’ so often I’m not conscious of what I’ve captured until I get back to the studio,” she says. “It’s there that I begin to compose my larger painting deciding what to keep and what to discard in order to tell my story, a process that resembles editing a film.”
Cooke continues to treasure those small studies that she refers to as “personal postcards,” because they remind her of the wonderful relationships that have developed while out painting with other artists. “These friendships are one of the biggest bonuses in my career,” she says. “Artists spend an enormous amount of time alone and being connected to people who truly understand the quest is a real blessing.”
Free spirited by nature, Cooke’s current lifestyle and her transition from commercial to fine artist have been strongly influenced by her need for independence. In the beginning, her conception was that only “real artists” painted in oils so she took courses in weaving and pottery in college, never imagining that little tubes of paint would one day become an indispensable part of her life.
Later, Cooke found employment in the film industry, first as a model, then as a coordinator and producer, and finally as a successful art director, using her creative talents to design sets and scenic backdrops for commercials for national and international corporations. During that period, she began to develop an interest in fine art and, hoping to hone her skills a bit, she enrolled in a local painting workshop. “It didn’t take me long to reaffirm the fact that I wanted my art to express who I was rather than becoming known as ‘a student of,’” she says.
Motivated by that realization, Cooke launched into a relentless course of self study, reading art books and haunting museums wherever she went. “I admire the techniques of the European Masters and the early California Impressionists, as well as the early Taos artists,” she says. Cooke’s determination began to produce results, and her big break came in 1997 when a group of her paintings was accepted for the Festival of Arts in Laguna Beach. Strong sales during the eight-week course of the show gave her the confidence she needed to consider turning her passion for landscapes into a full-time profession.
Finding herself as a fine artist was not the only fortuitous event in Cooke’s life during her tenure in the film industry; it was there that she met Nick Goodman, the man she would marry and who continues to work as a production designer in the Los Angeles area. “Nick believed in my talent from the first,” Cooke says, adding that he encouraged her to move out of management and into the art department and continues to cheer her accomplishments as a fine artist.
Cooke also receives support from her adult son, Justin Benham, who lives in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. “Justin flew up to Los Angeles in February to see my work in the Masters of the American West Show,” she says. “Now that’s a great kid. I felt especially blessed by that trip because Justin is as much of a workaholic as I am. In fact, I’m so addicted to painting that it’s often difficult to balance the business and the creative aspect of my work. Sometimes I feel just like the trick rider in a rodeo who has her feet on the backs of two horses, each pulling in a different direction.”
Cooke’s commitment to her vision is reaping impressive results. She earned the Collector’s Choice Award at the Rocky Mountain Plein Air Painters Invitational in Estes Park, Colorado, in 2003 and 2004 and this year is participating in her fourth Western Visions Show at the National Museum of Wildlife Art in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. Her greatest honor to date, however, was an invitation to participate in the 2005 Masters of the American West Exhibition at the Autry National Center in Los Angeles. Reflecting on what she has achieved in less than a decade, Cooke says, “I can’t believe how lucky I am to have found my destiny. I wake up each morning and look out my window at the 12,000-foot crest of Pagosa Peak. On sunny days, the light touches the tip and then slowly spills down the side until the mountain is covered in dazzling sunlight. Other days, the peak hides in the clouds, keeping its secrets.”
Reflecting on this visual imagery as an analogy of her life as a painter, Cooke says, “Some days are sparkling, while others might be a bit cloudy, but each one radiates its own unique beauty.”