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FASO Collector Recommends: Jill Banks
Biography
“Stylistically, I continue to evolve from realism with feeling to impressionism with even more emotion and simplification.” — Jill Banks
Life is full with family, friends like you, and an art career that keeps me smock-donned and constantly on my toes. Each year, I take personal painting trips -- with at least one to Europe - France (Paris - 2025 and the South of France - June 2026), Italy (the hill towns of Umbria in 2025), Spain (residency in 2027) and others to favorite spots in the US. My “French Paintings Collection” can be seen online here. Every place we’ve gone calls me back to it. Sure makes it hard to decide what the next trip should be.
My passion is for capturing life -- particularly people and animals where they gather. (That’s the impetus for those personal painting travel trips.) It has also driven me to become a plein air painter -- loving being right smack dab in the middle of the action. (Plein air is the one thing I swore I’d never do, ironically.)
Plein air competitions are balanced by plenty of exploration on my own -- with only my own drive to paint everything in sight to pressure me. ;) I’m honored to have been invited to participate in many of the top festivals including in 2026: Plein Air Easton (where I won 3rd Place!), Door County Invitational (WI), NC Plein Air (Plein Air Magazine Award), Telluride Plein Air (Top 5 Seller) and Olmsted Plein Air Invitational (#1 Top Seller). I used to think about wanting a clone -- because each time you are participating in one event, you are missing out on another. I’m attached to all the wonderful people we’ve met in all the events (plein air and art festivals) that have come before. It’s a rich, beautiful life. Other plein air events I’ve participated include: Gloucester Plein Air (VA), Knoxville’s Artist on Location, Sedona Plein Air, En Plein Air Texas, Wayne Plein Air, Mountain Maryland, Harford Plein Air and more.
See my web site’s Events page for upcoming shows and festivals.
Sometimes I do something spectacular. In 2011, I launched my 100 Faces in 100 Days Project, inviting friends, acquaintances and strangers of all ages to sit to have their portraits painted, allowing me to get to know my subjects and allowing my volunteers to get to know more about my passion -- painting -- in the process. For the first 100 consecutive days of 2011, I painted 100 different talking, moving faces from life and then posted photos of the paintings and reflections on the sitter and sitting on my blog (excerpts from that blog and all my faces can be found on my website here). What I learned from the project was that anything was achievable given hard work, flexibility, openness, a sense of humor and some problem-solving skills. Plus, it was exhilarating and fun living life out on a limb. That project led to my pursuing painting plein air or around town, inside and out. If people were no longer coming to visit daily in my studio, I was going to go out and find someone or something interesting to paint.
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Love the lively colors in Jill's painting.