Melba Miller and Carolyn Pitts will be showing their art at the Benton Branch Library at 115 Courthouse Dr., Benton, in an ongoing show.
Melba Miller is a Louisiana artist and Benton resident. She loves animals and has four dogs and supports animal conservation groups. She paints animals, pets, landscape and still life. Her mediums are oil, watercolor, pastels and collage.
She has studied under many national artists. Some of them are John Seerey-Lester, Don Edwards, Alan Flattman, Morgan Samuel Price, Sheila Parsons, Luphilia Middlebrooks, Bob Rohm and my mentor, June Tyler, plus many more.
Melba began taking art in 1980 while looking for a new hobby to fill her empty nest. She is a member of Shreveport Art Club, The Pastel Group and Louisiana Society of Animal Artist.
It is through Pitts’ personal travels and experiences that she is able to bring such beauty and depth to her paintings. She has traveled as far as the south Louisiana wetlands, to the Ozark Mountains, Colorado’s Rocky Mountains, Montana, Yellowstone National Park, east Alaska and West Coast collecting information and observing wildlife for her references for her paintings. Her travels have, also, taken her to England, Italy, Kruger National Park and Tshuksudu Game Reserve in South Africa.
Pitts’ experiences in the wild, observing wildlife in its natural environment, capturing rare moments with her photography and paintings brings her great artistic motivation. She enjoys sharing the beauty of nature and the sense of freedom with others through her photographs and paintings.
Carolyn Pitts, a Louisiana wildlife artist and photographer, lives with her husband in Benton. A wildlife conservationist at heart, she specializes in landscapes, wildlife and pet portraits. She fell in love with the outdoors in South Louisiana hunting and fishing with her husband, Jeffrey.
Among the techniques Pitts use are oil, pastel, watercolor and acrylic. She has studied under wildlife artist John Seerey-Lester, Kobus Moller, Don Edwards, Cory Carlson, Allan Flattman, Virginia Vaughn, Kitty Wallis, Mike Windberg, Dalhart Windberg, Mark McHaffey and Morgan Samuel Price.
Pitts is an active member in Louisiana Society of Animal Artist, Shreveport Pastel Society, Shreveport Art Club, Shreveport Hoover Society and Creative Art Connection. She teaches art at her studio.
