Dieka Rae
Dieka Rae was born in March 1970 in the small town of Richland,Washington.
Both her grandfathers were draftsmen and one of them was a furniture maker as
well. Rae’s mother and grandmother were artists, mostly drawing and painting.
Her father is a sculptor now living as a captain of a fishing boat in Maul. While
no one actively suggested any creative pursuits to Rae, there was a constant creative
environment in her childhood home. Her first exposure to art was at the age of
10, the family had just moved fromWashington to Phoenix. During one of her
first few days of a school in the new state, the class took a field trip to the Phoenix
Art Museum. Much of the art was influences by the Southwest style but had a
special exhibit of a collection from the Ming Dynasty, which was what impressed
her most. Soon after, she began experimenting first with #2 pencil pastels. As her
drawing skills grew, her style took on more of a vector quality and she began
graphic design. After high school, she enrolled at Collins Design School in
Phoenix, Arizona. She received a BA in Graphic Design and worked for ten years
as a graphic designer in Phoenix, Portland and New York City. She continued
drawing and painting on nights and weekends. Her style transcended to rich
abstracts with oil. Rae adores the soft fluid movement of oil and that translates to
an equal love for any medium such as wax that moves around the surface easily.
She made a decision to change from her graphic design career to pursuing an
illustration education. Rae believed a focus on illustration would improve
her overall artistic vision. She finished the illustration program at the
Portfolio Center in Atlanta, GA in 2003.
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