Erin Weirup is a self-taught artist who grew up on a farm outside Delmar, IA. She had originally started out in 2012 as a Fine Arts Major at Mount Mercy University in Cedar Rapids, IA. but was quickly discouraged from a career in the art field. From there she transferred to Iowa State University where she studied Event Management and Communications. Again, finding herself unhappy with the school she was at, she transferred one more time to the University of Colorado, Denver in 2017 where she continued her degree in Communications.
In Denver, she rediscovered her love of painting. Erin paid for school by teaching painting classes and selling small commission works until 2020 when the COVID19 pandemic shut down most customer service workplaces and she could no longer afford to stay in Colorado. This ultimately leads her back to the Midwest.
During this time, painting was the only thing she could rely on and the dark economic times, which caused many sleepless nights, inspired her to particularly focus on nocturnal landscapes and cityscapes. She found comfort and beauty in subject matter that could still display color in the absence of light and that is the mood she illustrates in her work.
It was in Denver where she rediscovered her love of painting. Erin paid for school by teaching painting classes and selling small commission works until 2020 when the COVID19 pandemic shut down most customer service workplaces and she could no longer afford to stay in Colorado. This ultimately led her back to the Midwest
During this time, the painting was the only thing she could rely on and the dark economic times, which caused many sleepless nights, inspired her to particularly focus on nocturnal landscapes and cityscapes. She found comfort and beauty in subject matter that could still display color in the absence of light and that is the mood she illustrates in her work.
Artist Statment
I am a self-taught midwest based artist who has been inspired to put a collection of works together after moving from Denver, Colorado back to Eastern Iowa as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic. There were many sleepless nights spent outside for socially-distanced fresh air taking in both nocturne cityscapes and landscapes. Although times were turbulent, I thought those moments were beautiful. Every artist, especially those drawn to landscapes, has a moment or visual epiphany that inspires them to recreate what they see. I had this feeling toward nocturnal landscapes and in particular landscapes and subject matter that still provides rich color in the absence of light. Just because the sun goes down, or a light source is hidden, doesn’t mean that the color of a subject is gone. It is in those eerie late hours of the night and the stillness of the very early mornings when the world is quiet that I find the most tranquil scenes in which I strive to share.