" I love oil paint. I love the gooey textures and the thick, rich colors, and, yes, the smell. Unlike watercolors, I can change any stroke at any time; the entire painting experience is dynamic.
I am fascinated by time and the illusion of space. I often play with the transparency and opacity of the oil paint to achieve the feeling of layering and depth - time and space.
In my work there is often a fine line between a realist and an abstract painting. The illusion of three dimensional space on a two dimensional canvas is a time honored concept that I still love to explore and manipulate, creating questions in the viewer's mind.
But mostly I paint."

Melinda Cootsona is a native of Northern California. She attended the California College of Arts and Crafts in Oakland where she received her BFA in Interior Architectural Design in 1981. She worked full-time in both the Interior and Graphic Design fields for over twelve years..."from furniture systems to album covers." She also taught design for two years at the Academy of Art College in San Francisco. 

Melinda resigned from her full-time interiors position in 1989 to concentrate on fine art, specifically oil painting. Her work is influenced by the early California impressionists, and particularly by the Northern California group called the Society of Six. She has furthered her education by studying with Ted Goerschner and William Rushton.

Melinda's work falls into three categories: Still Lifes, Landscapes and Abstracts, and they are often produced in series. However, the unifying factor throughout her paintings is a strong sense of color and composition. Pulling from a "California palette" the artist's work is vibrant and saturated with a keen sense of light. A graphic and architectural influence can be seen in much of her work as well.

In 2003 Melinda was selected as one of the artists represented in the book ART OF NORTHERN CALIFORNIA. She has also been included in THE ART COLLECTOR and will be in the upcoming book, AMERICAN ART COLLECTOR,  which will be released in the Fall of 2005.

She is represented by the Eriksen Gallery in Half Moon Bay, CA, and the Studio Gallery in Burlingame, CA.