Lori Schappe-Youens

“My work is a combination of spirit, humor, and sensitivity, as well as a hunger for growth,” says expressionistic painter Lori Schappe-Youens. “I am moved by color—by how it translates onto the substrate and plays with the eye. I love texture as it gives grit and substance to what I do—where I am—where I am going. Grit is good.”

With a range of that is at times symbolic and figurative work to that which is abstract, Schappe-Youens has developed an iconic visual vocabulary that speaks with joy, insight, and humor. “I believe that there is humor in most of this life, if you look simply enough at it, and that often is translated into quite wacky, wonderful, half human, half animal-insect-plants, smiling at the frailties of this human/animal condition.”

Schappe-Youens grew up in Madison and attended University of Wisconsin before relocating to South Africa in 1992. She considers herself a “soul resident” of both countries.