Artist to show her Visions

Library exhibit will showcase painter's latest works in oils

Jane Marquez's first trip to Las Vegas was at age 21, on her way to San Diego on a whirlwind, gypsy-like move from Florida with her best girlfriends.

Marquez's view of Las Vegas has changed since then. She moved to the city's southeast area six years ago. Along with the move came a desire to put momentum into her artwork.

Since then, she has created 13 pole banner designs that line Las Vegas Boulevard North in front of the Las Vegas Library and Lied Discovery Children's Museum. She has exhibited her paintings in solo shows at the Lloyd D. George U.S. Courthouse foyer and the Enterprise, Charleston Heights, Whitney and Laughlin libraries. Competitions with the Las Vegas Art Museum and group exhibitions with the Reed Whipple Cultural Center and the Arts Center in Boulder City dot her resume.

Her next exhibit, Visions of the Southwest, which opens to the public today at the Spring Valley Library, is a risk for the painter. Where she has worked mostly in acrylic paints and pastels before, this is her first showing of her oil paintings.

"I went through this transition," she said. "I was fighting the desert."

She's come a long way since nearly walking out of a workshop that taught her to paint Southwestern vistas. Southwest landscapes use earth tones, almost a direct opposite of what Marquez was used to in California. She forced herself to break away from routine and California's cleaner color palette and different hues.

Marquez visited Valley of Fire and Sedona, Ariz., to paint. The result is "Visions of the Southwest."

"I'm taking a big chance," she said of her show. "And I hope it's only the beginning. I think I'm going to like it."

"Her work is very strong," said Denise Shapiro, gallery services coordinator for the Las Vegas-Clark County Library District. "Our criteria is very broad. It's just a case that she's an excellent artist."

Marquez exhibited pastel portraits during Native American Heritage Month for the district.

"Jane has a diversity," Shapiro said. "She's married to a Latino man. She, at one time, had an exhibit about that as well."

No longer fighting the desert, Marquez paints "en plein aire," an Impressionistic French term for painting outdoors, as much as possible. She photographs the landscape when she arrives and before she leaves to capture the light shifts. Many of her paintings are a mix of live interpretation, moments captured on film and her imagination.

"It's a necessity. I need to go outdoors and paint," she said. "Make it what you want."

Marquez took one art class in 1986 while her children were in school. The canvas drew her in, and she received her associate's degree in fine arts with a painting emphasis in 1990 from Palomar College in San Marcos, Calif. She then traded her career in mortgages to pursue her lifelong passion for art.

"I decided I hated business," Marquez said, laughing.

She taught art classes to children and adults for 11 years, but she recently gave up teaching to concentrate on her work.

"I want to take my art as far as I can go. One of these days, I might go back to it," Marquez said. "Right now, I want to concentrate on art."

The library district has about 80 exhibits a year in 13 galleries. The library galleries were created approximately 20 years ago to fill a perceived community need for neighborhood art exhibits, Shapiro said.

"I have a year waiting list. It's very much galleries of our community, but I also bring in artists," Shapiro added. "Specifically, we have an audience of people who have never been to a museum or gallery before."

Visions of the Southwest will be on display at Spring Valley Library, 4280 S. Jones Blvd., through Sept. 21. Those interested can call the library at 507-3820.


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