About The Artist
Valerie Peterson Visual Artist | Illustrator | Sculptor
Valerie Peterson is a multidisciplinary artist with over three decades of creative experience spanning illustration, painting, and sculpture. Her work has been collected nationally and internationally, with projects ranging from commissioned portraits and murals to fine art sculptures featured in international exhibitions.
Alongside her studio practice, Peterson has worked as a coach, instructor, and designer, bringing creativity and storytelling into every role. Based in Eureka Springs, Arkansas, she continues to create artwork inspired by places, animals and memories... always with the goal of making meaningful connections through art.
Artist Statement
My work is rooted in traditional portraiture, approached through a contemporary, painterly realism. Whether painting people, animals, or personal subjects, I am drawn to quiet, enduring images that prioritize likeness, presence, and emotional familiarity over surface detail or trend-driven style.
I focus on creating portraits that feel calm and respectful...paintings that allow the subject to be recognized not only physically, but personally. Subtle value relationships, restrained color, and controlled edges play a central role in my process, allowing the subject to emerge naturally from the background rather than being sharply separated from it.
Rather than fully describing every element, I choose what to suggest and what to leave unresolved. This restraint is intentional. I believe a portrait is strongest when it invites the viewer to linger, when it feels lived with rather than immediately consumed.
My goal is to create work that holds up over time...portraits that feel honest, dignified, and quietly present, capable of becoming part of a family’s visual history, whether that subject is human , place, or animal.
My work is rooted in traditional portraiture, approached through a contemporary, painterly realism. Whether painting people, animals, or personal subjects, I am drawn to quiet, enduring images that prioritize likeness, presence, and emotional familiarity over surface detail or trend-driven style.
I focus on creating portraits that feel calm and respectful...paintings that allow the subject to be recognized not only physically, but personally. Subtle value relationships, restrained color, and controlled edges play a central role in my process, allowing the subject to emerge naturally from the background rather than being sharply separated from it.
Rather than fully describing every element, I choose what to suggest and what to leave unresolved. This restraint is intentional. I believe a portrait is strongest when it invites the viewer to linger, when it feels lived with rather than immediately consumed.
My goal is to create work that holds up over time...portraits that feel honest, dignified, and quietly present, capable of becoming part of a family’s visual history, whether that subject is human , place, or animal.