Celebrated for her large-scale, luminous poured canvases, Bette Ridgeway has devoted five decades to developing her unusual pouring technique, garnering international recognition in the process.

Her mentor Paul Jenkins (1923-2012), the acclaimed Abstract Expressionist, encouraged the artist in 1979 to work large, eliminate subject matter and focus on color, space and time. Ridgeway followed his advice and has developed and refined her signature technique.

Located in Santa Fe, New Mexico since the mid-1990s, Ridgeway is represented by numerous galleries and has been shown in over 85 gallery and museum exhibitions internationally, including a concomitant juried exhibition at the 58th Venice Biennale, Venice, Italy. Her work is included in many public and private collections.

Her recent awards include the 2025 Leonardo DaVinci International Prize, the Caravaggio International Prize 2022, the Michelangelo International Prize 2021, and “Top 60 Contemporary Masters 2017” by Art Tour International Magazine. In addition, she won the Oxford University Alumni Prize at the “Art of the Mind” exhibition at the Chianciano Art Museum in Tuscany, Italy. She has been published in noteworthy art journals and catalogues such as Monk Magazine, United Kingdom; and LandEscape Art Review.

Pushing the boundaries of light, color and design, Bette Ridgeway is best known for her large-scale, luminous poured canvases, which, in recent years have garnered international recognition.

The artist maintains a practice in Santa Fe, NM, where the high desert light fuels her creative spirit. Her career began in 1960 in the sweatshop of Reuben Donnelley Advertising as a young graphic artist and over many decades taken her to the outdoor marketplaces in Tananarive, Madagascar, the urban dynamism of Santiago, Chile and the modern youthful capital of Australia in New South Wales - Canberra. And… man y places in between.

Stimulated by the variety of the colors and customs on 5 continents, along with growing up in the beautiful Adirondack Mountains of upstate New York, Ridgeway continues to perfect her unusual pouring technique.

In 1979 she was fortunate to meet internationally acclaimed artist, Paul Jenkins. This was a life-changing experience. Jenkins became a good friend and mentor, encouraging the artist to work large and focus on color, space and time. After 8 long years of painting, Jenkins finally said she was ready for a show. That was in 1988. A solo show at FOTA Gallery in Alexandria, Va was a sellout and a turning point. She quit her day job and began painting full time…a dream come true!

Now in her fifth decade of pouring paint, the artist is taking time to reflect. She is looking deeply into her creative impulses and sees clearly that her joy is color. She is in love with the movement in her work, sometimes kinetic and full of emotion, sometimes bold and masterful, sometimes languid and tentative.

Ridgeway’s journey has not been an easy one. But there are moments in the studio when everything is working so incredibly well - the music is playing, and the creative wheels are jamming. Time does not exist for her. The art unfolds under her tiny but strong hands. She is the channel. It is not hers. Like a child, it comes through her, but it is not hers. It goes out into the world – it has a life of its own.

www.RidgewayStudio.com

Aug 17 Bette Ridgeway

Aug 17 Eva Moosbrugger

Aug 17 Leticia (Leta) Herrera