Nella Lush
Bio
Nella was born, raised, and educated in Italy. She studied art history and foreign languages at the Universita’ del Salento, Lecce, Italy. She speaks five languages. In the late 70 and early 80s, she lived in Spain for nearly eight years due to her husband’s job. It was in Spain that her marine art was sought. She completed many art commissions for yacht clubs and private collectors. Her success did not make her happy, as she felt trapped and longed to paint for herself. Upon returning to the US, she took a short break and started exploring and experimenting with different mediums. She continued searching for her artistic expression/voice. She maintains that artists should never feel too comfortable with their art, and the process of evolving is a necessary one for growth. While her three children were young, Nella developed a curriculum where she taught Italian to young children using art as a tool. She would offer art camps to middle schoolers and high schoolers every summer. To this day, she says that the youngsters were the ones that inspired her art!
She is a full-time artist with a studio in North Andover, MA, and 450 Harrison Ave, Boston.
Nella is very active in the art communities and an avid volunteer of many organizations.
She was the Founder of the Massachusetts Chapter of the National Association of Women Artists (NYC), the oldest Association in the US of Women Artists (1889), and served for two terms as the President.
She is the Founder of the Experimental Group of RAA&M and serves on the Rockport Art Association and Museum board as the chair of the Group. The group’s mission is to foster, promote, and encourage self-expression by giving the opportunity to artists to come together, explore, and share ideas toward creative freedom. It is hard for me to think of a day when art was not the main focus.
Statement- From early childhood, I was exposed to the world of creating through my grandmothers, one a botanical artist and the other a textile artist. I never thought of myself as being an artist. Creating was natural. We stayed occupied by sculpting with clay at the river bank or drawing at the kitchen table with my siblings. As I grew older, I kept adding more, painting, writing stories, writing poetry, gardening, cooking, decorating, designing, and the list goes on and on. It is normal now that when reflecting on my artistic journey, I see a tapestry of colors, shapes, and forms, years upon years of experimenting, never tired of stretching my art to another dimension. To seek, find, absorb and inform my being of that priceless inner value, my spirituality. I create because I need to; it is vital to my existence, a necessity, an obsession, it is oxygen, and without it, I would cease to live. Life inspires me, and nature is the fuel. It is my choice not to copy nature but rather to express it in my way, through my memories and emotions. I create abstract and marine works. The sea and sky are endless sources of inspiration. Without knowing I create seascapes, I don’t need to draw them I just need to let them come out when the time is right!
”I don’t seek perfection; I seek expression.” I don’t like to be categorized in any specific genre; the focus and only focus is the act of creating. It doesn’t matter what materials and tools I use; what matters is the energy that each creation emanates, it is that magical connection between the viewer and the art, the stories a viewer can create when viewing my art, the way the viewer explores and makes my art their journey, that is my ART!”
Gallery Representation
Cortile Gallery, Provincetown, MA
Thomas Henry Gallery, Nantucket, MA
Thomas Henry Gallery, Newlyn, Cornwall. UK
White Room Gallery, Bridge Hampton, NY
Signature Member of the American Society of Marine Artists (A.S.M.A.)
