A passionate artist with decades of experience to her credit, Ronda R. Gish began delving into the creative arts at a formative age. Although initially met with hesitation from her family and peers, Ms. Gish exemplified fortitude and determination to create a thriving career in fine art, emphasizing that art is defined by its emotional expression rather than financial gain. Impressively, she was the youngest student chosen by her local congregational church to attend a three-week-long art course sponsored by the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign when she was 13 years old. Following several years of academic studies, Ms. Gish endeavored to focus her career on the arts beginning in 1988.
Since that time, Ms. Gish has excelled as the owner of an art studio, Captive Image 1, where she displays her fine art and features a plethora of guest artists. Having exhibited her work extensively over the course of her career, she has won several accolades from the local mayor and Best in Show Awards in such mediums as oil and acrylic paint. She also works in the areas of figure drawing, portraits, and realism as a commissioned artist, utilizing ink, watercolor paint, clay, glass, metal, canvas, and wall murals. Although she has experienced numerous career achievements, Ms. Gish is exceptionally proud to enter her first fine art show in approximately two decades, where she won Best in Show and was subsequently exposed to the grander scale of the art world. Furthermore, she has been a featured artist at Camelback Gallery.
Notably, Ms. Gish aims to express her feelings and inspirations through her artwork, with a propensity for paving her own path, even if it may veer from the expectations and trends of conventional crowds. In this regard, she notes that the world is large, and there is room for every artist on earth to thrive. Above all else, Ms. Gish reiterates the importance of listening to one’s own heart. Always enjoying the process of creating art and how it moves its audience, she feels that being an artist is not simply a career – it is a lifestyle and world of its own.
Looking toward the future, Ms. Gish aims to continue improving her artistic prowess and eventually rely on her work with Captive Image 1 as her primary vocation. To this end, she intends to maximize her productivity and attain success on a larger scale to become self-sufficient.
