"Young Montana Artist Honored . . . " Park County Weekly Thursday, July 30, 1998

Los Angeles, October 27, 1997: Livingston artist Amber Jean made an impression at the LA Artexpo this Fall where she was chosen by the public as their favorite artist. The juried show had 60 emerging artists from around the world. Amber Jean was awarded the “People’s Choice Award” based on the public’s votes fro their favorite artist.

“I am fueled by chocolate and driven by a head full of ideas like children all demanding to be let out first. I work hard to free them.”

Amber Jean’s totems, fountains, boxes and other sculptural works are intricately carved and beautifully stained. Sometimes the colors and subjects are astonishingly realistic, like the life-size rattlesnake carved into a fountain which looks like it could bite if it were touched. Other times her subjects are playfully animated and intoxicatingly colorful characters. “The works of Amber Jean were the most original and profound, drawing on the archetypal sources reflecting both the joy and spontaneity of contemporary Mexican street carvers and the more subtle, refined imagery and techniques inspired by her broad formal and informal education. These pieces conveyed timeless subjects and themes filled with wonder, darkness, light, humor and passion,” writes the poet Greg Keeler, Professor at Montana State University.

“What of my art? There are sculptures, which celebrate, commemorate, stir quietly or dance loudly. Wood is endlessly beautiful, inviting and challenging. Lately a number of other materials have been working themselves into my sculptures creating new challenges, increasing my pallet and expanding my work’s capacity for thematic possibilities.”

Amber Jean lives in a cabin at the end of the road near the top of a mountain in Paradise Valley where she creates her sculptures using chainsaws, power tools, and chisels. Focusing her financial resources on her career, she lived for years without power and has yet to add indoor plumbing to her home.

“After electricity became part of my life, I added a computer, phone, and fax. Most of my commissions are out-of-state so the website allows greater communication with my clients, enabling them to view a work in progress via photos accessed instantly over the world wide web. I can remain a hermit, venturing into cities to install commissions, exhibit my work, and take in the sites-after, which I am always glad to return to my forest studio with a view of three mountain ranges and the Yellowstone River. I collect my thoughts and get back to work, woodchips and sawdust flying.”

Amber began creating life size figures in metal when she was sixteen and has since continued her avid explorations of various media, although three-dimensional work remains her favorite. Born in Gillette, Wyoming and raised in Montana, Amber Jean completed her Fine Arts degree at Montana State University after attending the Bremer Kunstschule in Germany and the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts in Philadelphia. She has completed commissions from Florida to California, exhibited in group and solo shows, and her work has recently been featured in several nationally syndicated magazines.

Contact Amber at: 406-222-9251 – Fax: 406-222-8865 – amber@amberjean.com