Colleen Johansen Oil Painter
She paints the soul of the Pacific Northwest
Colleen Johansen’s work is deeply informed by the natural beauty and quiet complexity of the Pacific Northwest. Since 1994, she has lived on San Juan Island, where the surrounding landscape continues to shape both her subject matter and artistic sensibility. She and her husband reside on a small farm shared with geese and llamas, where waterfowl frequently gather at their pond. The rhythms of rural island life, combined with the Pacific Northwest region’s dramatic scenery, provide a continual source of inspiration for her paintings.
Johansen draws from the rugged cliffs, wooded landscapes, ocean vistas, farmland, and quiet country roads that define the San Juan Islands. Her work is often centered on the interplay of shape, texture, atmosphere, and light found in the natural world. The expansive waters of the Pacific Northwest, its shifting skies, and ever-changing cloud formations remain enduring influences within her work.
An art major in high school, Johansen’s early passion for painting was temporarily set aside as life led her in other directions. When she returned to art, she continued to refine her voice as a self-taught painter through the encouragement of fellow artists, extensive study, books, and instructional materials.
Her artistic perspective has also been shaped by living in several regions of striking natural beauty, including Southern California, Lake Tahoe, upstate New York, and Hawaii. Each environment has contributed to her sensitivity to atmosphere, color, and the emotional presence of landscape.
Johansen’s process begins with a thick, high-quality canvas, often stretched by hand and prepared with a warm sienna ground. Working exclusively in oils, she uses paints produced by a small U.S. manufacturer. Many of her paintings are created in a gallery-wrap format, allowing the image to extend around the edges of the canvas and creating a sense of visual continuity without the need for framing.
Her compositions often begin with one or more photographic references, from which she sketches the foundational structure with a fine brush before blocking in larger shapes and values. Painting from dark to light and working within a “limited palette”, she gradually builds atmosphere, depth, and luminosity across the surface.
Though grounded in realism, Johansen embraces elements of impressionism and expressionism, allowing mood, energy, and subject matter to guide the final painting. Through her work, she invites viewers into landscapes that feel both intimate and expansive—places shaped not only by observation, but by memory, atmosphere, and emotional connection.