Seeking patrons of the arts!

     Online viewing gallery:  http://www.LoriHiggins.com
Facebook:   https://www.facebook.com/LoriHiggins.Art

I'm a self-taught artist that started painting back in 1999, and in 2010 began sculpting. My first sculpture was a life-size bronze of my painting "Spirit of Aloha" (view at: www.lorihiggins.com ).

For the past 2 years, I've been working on my second piece,"The Dancer". I need to get this 2/3rd life-size sculpture molded and cast so that I can place one on display. The mold will cost approx 13K and the foundry is estimating 10k to cast as is at this time.
When I completed the "Spirit of Aloha", I was 1/2 owner of a gallery in Maui, but there was a takeover back in 2012. Although I was able to finally get ownership of my own art, I was left with huge debt associated with that business.

Hence, I'm back to being "just an artist" and no longer have company backing for R&D (ie: molding and casting my new sculpture).
This has weighed heavily on my heart as to how I can have "The Dancer" molded and cast She's a few weeks out from being completely finished and ready for the foundry, and I'm looking forward to presenting her to the world.

A friend suggested this site to raise money through crowdfunding, but I need  to give something in return, so I'm going to hold 2 drawings to those who donate.

- For every 25$ donated, you'll be emailed a ticket number...

- Once I've reached halfway through my goal, the drawing will be live online, and the winner will have a choice of 1 of seven different limited edition reproduction paintings from me. (Hand embellished and framed, including the opportunity to have it personalized in some fashion.) 

-A second drawing will be held for the remaining half.

-I'll email you a photo of your drawing ticket(s) # , and will announce the online drawing when I get to the halfway point

- the seven Artist Proof choices are:

1- "Destinys Path"
2- "Florentine"
3- "Ohia and Lehua"
4- "Ke'ala"s
5- "Enlightened Anguish"
6- "Raven"
7- "Spirit Lover"

******For anyone donating 6K or more, I'm offering a commissioned oil painting of a loved one!**********
Send me a photo, and I will do a portrait from it, oil on wood panel , approx 10x14 (see my sample commission page- the "little cowboy" commission to view my latest portrait commissions!)

Please visit my Blogspot for more details and photos!
  http://lorihiggins.blogspot.com


--------------------

ARTIST STATEMENT
by Lori Higgins


I spent  many years searching for what I was “supposed” to do in life. I traveled, studied, worked a variety of jobs, always looking but never finding my calling. After graduating from a university in Europe with a degree in Psychology, I joined a British aid organization as a convoy driver in the Bosnian war (one of many instances where I used to seek challenging and male dominated activities as I felt a need to prove that a woman could be as strong as a man if not better). The experience exposed to me to many extremes: love, hate, perseverance, life and death. Everything I saw and felt there stretched me in so many different emotional directions. Upon my return to the States in 1995, I was detached, restless and repatriation seemed impossible.

It’s obvious now that what I was experiencing was PTSD, but back then I was just desperate to find an outlet for all the pent up emotions that were starting to overflow. In late 1997, I found myself on Maui and soon after started painting. I had purchased some paints and brushes, and things just poured out. (I remember loving the feel that I was ten again and in the studio of an oil painter my mother found to give me lessons.) At first it was incredibly therapeutic for me, but once others noticed and wanted my paintings because of the raw emotion and feelings they stirred, my purpose came into perspective. I realized that what I had been so fervently seeking all over the world was actually inside me. Sensing that I had the talent, I spent the next years studiously developing the skill, one painting at a time.

I get asked a lot about why I created any one piece. My inspiration for a painting or sculpture may be derived from a number of different things: how I’m feeling that day, a past experience, a moment I enjoyed, a hula dance, a flower, or an emotion. For instance, at an upcountry fair on Maui many years ago, I watched a mother pick up her child. The child had no interest and was pulling away, reaching out for something else, when her mother just hugged her. That hug did not get nor need reciprocation; it was strong yet delicate, private and so touching. It was that very second of unconditional love that inspired the painting “Tender Love”.  I felt I had to capture and share such a rare and fleeting moment of such deep love and emotion.  

My pieces typically embrace the power of the female spirit, and many subjects are looking up and out, away from the material world and toward the spiritual. I like to use sepia tones in some pieces to give them a more timeless, placeless feel. My subjects are not “portraits” per se, as I try and keep their personality out so they don’t look like someone specific. This allows the viewer to look past the subject and see or feel the emotion and spirit of it instead. (Only when I do a portrait commission does the personality of the subject become key.)

After much success with painting, in 2011,  I decided to challenge myself again and make my creations three dimensional.  I began sculpting with “Spirit of Aloha”.  Having never been trained in the sculpting process, it took a couple of years to complete the process of sculpting the life size piece in clay and having it bronzed, but when she was done, the sculpture of "Spirit of Aloha" was amazing, and the accomplishment fulfilling. I have a few more in the works including “The Dancer” and a second inspired by my painting “Ka No’ono’o”.

Currently I live in the high desert of Prescott, Arizona near the bronze foundry I use for my sculptures. Now that I am no longer in the gallery or framing business that occupied me 24/7 through most of my 30’s, I can concentrate strictly on my own art. I spend my days painting and sculpting, with long walks in between, letting the crisp coolness and heat of the desert inspire and replenish me. It’s a  stark yet beautiful contrast to the tropical islands I love and miss.

Through Hawaiian and Southwestern themes, and the realms in between, I explore through paint and clay how to make the human figure touch us on a spiritual level regardless of the theme. That challenge of bringing alive a blank canvas or slab of clay, has become my passion and that “purpose” I had always sought.
Online Viewing Gallery