Life and art can offer compelling and undulating textures, especially for painter Kelley Batson.
The opening of her new studio in downtown Eustis marks a new chapter in Batson’s career and celebrates her perseverance.
Before taking on the full-time role of a professional fine artist almost a decade ago, Batson channeled her creativity into her work as a marketing director for her family’s greenhouse business, which involved handling sales, producing graphics and other communication.
Since 2017, the Eustis resident has been making a living as an artist and now does business as KBatsonArt (see her works at kbatsonart.com).
Up until a year ago, she occupied a space as an artist in residence at the Leesburg Center for the Arts.
She calls that time “a blessing.”
“My time at the Leesburg Center for the Arts allowed me space to do some experimenting with oil and cold wax that I didn’t have in my local studio,” she told the Daily Commercial. “I had time there to play and learn while doing.”
The center, she reminded us, went through a period of upheaval while she was there, when “a wonderful guy,” Richard Colvin, took over as director.
“Richard was one of the first people to critique my work when I came out of the garage to show my work locally,” she reminisced, “so I was super excited to see the direction he would take the LCFA.
“During the end of my stay there, I was distracted due to a family health issue. It left me without the necessary time to dedicate to the Center as a resident artist should. So, in November 2023 I moved from the space and literally, the next month, my daughter got the call for her liver transplant. God really knows what he is doing. Richard found a wonderful watercolor artist to fill the space, Jackii Molsick, and he has good things happening there.”
Good news: Batson’s daughter is on the mend. “She’s doing great! Her one-year anniversary was December 15th. It was indeed a miracle from God.”
With the new move to downtown Eustis, Batson is ready to get seriously back to work, and a little voice keeps telling her something.
“I keep hearing ‘retreat and create.’ Not sure what that will bring, but time will tell.”
Batson’s first solo brick-and-mortar studio can be found in a charming nook locals know as McCulloch’s Alley. It’s the type of spot, an artist would fantasize about, and her opening celebration coincides with Eustis’ First Friday-April 2025 celebration.
“My new spot in downtown Eustis is absolutely a dream come true!” Batson proclaimed. “This space overlooks a brand new coffeehouse that has just opened. I can see them and they can see me. Hoping that will generate some interest in what’s happening up there. The space has a wonderful energy to it and it is more than twice the space I’m used to.
“It came to me by divine edict, I’m certain. It will allow me to invite visitors in regularly to see my completed work and what I’m working on. And, as any establishment hopes, that will lead to more art sales. I plan on doing an open house during each First Friday event monthly and the Eustis Wine Walks as they happen.”
The Lake County-based painter hopes to partner with other downtown businesses, “so we can help each other be a success.”
“I’ve lived in Eustis for 30 years. Since opening my art practice, I’ve hauled art around to Orlando, Ormond Beach, Daytona, New Smyrna Beach, Bradenton, Ocala, etc., all over Central Florida, but I’ve decided it is time to stay closer to home, to help drive some much-needed traffic to our area as the city works hard to beautify it. It’s time to bring art enthusiasts to me instead of the other way around. I’m praying this spot helps do that. I want our downtown area to be successful. It has such wonderful potential.”
“There are layers and layers of textures in our world if we would only stop long enough to see them. Those textures and layers are what I strive to show the viewer.”
Batson’s art should draw foot traffic, as well. Her paintings transcend mere decorative wall hangings but are also pleasing to look at and accent a room.
She has experimented with technique and texture, conjuring dreamy abstract landscapes, and has placed in juried competitions. Some paintings appear like a horizon through a half-dreaming gaze.
“I’ve discovered I paint from a place of emotion that I must share with the viewer,” Batson says in her artist statement, adding that she wants to elicit a “flashback to a memory, a place, a time, a feeling.”
For those who question anything that isn’t literal, think of her approach this way: Batson likes to paint what she describes as “glimpses of memory, flashes of light and patterns, all using many layers of transparent paint and making marks into the paint.”
In conversation, the Alabama native is anything but pretentious. A University of Alabama fan, she is as down to earth as much as her works appear otherworldly.
Though she’s not crazy about the self-promotion aspects of her profession, she enjoys talking about her process in a descriptive but conversational, intimate manner.
Her latest series, “Textures on Canvas” offers no exception. She delights in telling us that it was created using acrylic paints and acrylic gel medium to create a heavy 3-D look in her works.
“Each piece begins with a base layer of texture and color wash and is added to layer by layer,” she explained.
“Each application of paint changes the piece. As an intuitive painter, this makes the process fun to create. There’s always something new with each layer and decisions to make about what to do next. Each of these creations is process-driven. They are about what happens when you add water, add paint, add rubs, add alcohol and then reacting to that change.”
As always, she paints with a sense of recognition from her mind’s eye.
“For instance, ‘Gilded Wildflowers’ was never really complete until it received the gold-colored rub at the very end that homogenized the piece. I had no idea that one act would make it a completed painting. That gold rub changed everything that went before it.”
All of her work, she said, from her minimalist landscapes to the textured pieces in her new series, are inspired by a love of nature and the textures around us.
“There are layers and layers of textures in our world if we would only stop long enough to see them. Those textures and layers are what I strive to show the viewer.”
This article originally appeared on Daily Commercial: Artist Kelley Batson opens her first studio in downtown Eustis
