Biki Andres Chaplain

Born in 1943, Biki grew up in Texas where she received her bachelors degree. In the 1960's, she moved to Southern Illinois where she painted part-time while working as a Public Service Administrator and raising three children. She was finally able to pursue her career as an artist full-time in 2003. 
Art and creativity have been a part of her life since Biki was a child.  She has traveled through Europe, the Far East and the Middle East studying first hand works by the great masters.  Her work has been influenced by both the European and Russian Impressionists.  She has also attended classes and workshops with local and national artists, including Vives Atsara and Don Sahli.
Over the years, she has used a variety of mediums - pencil, pen & ink, pastel, and watercolor - but in recent years her work has been primarily in oil. She works in plein-air or in her studio from sketches and photographs completed on site.  Biki loves to recreate a scene to communicate to viewers the beauty she sees and to stir their emotions with a sense of excitement or feeling of joy and peace. She is fascinated by nature's light, vibrant color, and by people in their environment.  Her inspiration comes from people and nature, and often includes scenes from her travels.
Biki prefers to work wet-in-wet without modifying the paint with a medium, her paintings can be textured by the use of palette knives. She enjoys manipulating the paint on the canvas to create that memorable image or character and likes to work quickly and spontaneously to capture the feeling and convey an impression of the scene.
In recent years, Biki has exhibited in a number of local and regional shows and has won awards for her work.  She has had several solo exhibits in the Southern Illinois area.  Her work can be found at the Southern Illinois Artisans Gallery. 
Currently, she is working on a series of paintings of the Barns and Farms of the Midwest.