The Origin Story
Shelley Rygg’s artistic foundation was laid early, shaped by a home where creativity was both valued and lived. Her mother, a teacher who majored in art and practiced as an artist herself, recognized Shelley’s natural abilities and encouraged her to pursue art throughout her life. That steady support was reinforced by Shelley’s teachers, who consistently urged her to follow an artistic path.
A lifelong student and lover of art, Shelley immersed herself deeply in creative study from a young age. In high school, she served as art club president and devoted herself to developing her skills across disciplines. Her formal training continued in college, where she studied a wide range of studio practices — including drawing, ceramics, etching, and oil painting — and began selling much of her work. Her education also took her abroad to Madrid, where she studied life drawing, expanding both her technical ability and her artistic perspective.
Shelley’s academic background includes extensive studio coursework and art history studies, grounding her practice in both technique and context. Alongside her artistic development, her professional career challenged her to think in new ways, reinforcing a mindset that embraces possibility and innovation. She carries a belief that art is a force that amplifies change — and that change itself is life — a philosophy she sees as shared between artists and technical innovators alike.
Her aesthetic sensibilities were deeply influenced by the French Impressionists. Growing up surrounded by books on artists such as Renoir, Van Gogh, and Monet, she developed an early appreciation for light, atmosphere, and expressive color. At the same time, her studies have led her to value artistic traditions across cultures and eras, giving her work a foundation that is both historically informed and broadly appreciative.
When Art Called Again
In order to build a stable life and raise a family, Shelley Rygg pursued a career in information technology, where her creativity found a different outlet. She developed software systems within corporate environments and led teams in delivering innovative technological solutions. Even in this structured field, she carried the same inventive mindset that shaped her artistic thinking.
There were pivotal moments when art resurfaced as more than a background presence. After the 2008 recession, art became a source of grounding and renewal during a period of uncertainty. Years later, as she began planning for retirement, she made a conscious decision to return to art with greater focus — seeing it as a long-awaited gift to herself after years of professional and personal dedication.
Art had always been part of her life’s vision. Inspired in part by her mother, who held her first art exhibition at age 88 and sold more paintings than any other artist at the venue, Shelley reflects on timing with honesty and humility. Though naturally reserved and aware of the vast community of talented artists around her, she felt a growing clarity: there is no reason to wait.
The Inner Landscape
For Shelley, painting is a deeply immersive experience. When she works, the outside world fades, replaced by a focused, almost otherworldly state of awareness. Time softens, distractions dissolve, and the act of painting becomes both meditative and transporting.
She works primarily in oil paint, drawn to its richness, blendability, and slow drying time, which allows her to move with intuition rather than urgency. Acrylics also remain part of her practice when their specific qualities serve her vision.
Shelley approaches art through feeling rather than rigid structure. She values intuition over prescribed methods, believing that what “seems right” in the moment is the truest guide. While she acknowledges that patterns found in nature — such as the Fibonacci sequence or compositional harmonies — can offer meaningful avenues of exploration, she resists arbitrary rules or formulas that disconnect the artist from direct perception and emotional response.
Her philosophy centers on seeing, sensing, and responding — allowing the work to unfold rather than forcing it into predetermined systems.
Under the Setting Sun
Throughout her life, Shelley has painted a wide range of subjects, from portraits to landscapes, and in many formats and sizes. In recent years, however, her focus has turned toward sunsets — which she describes as nature’s most magnificent abstraction.
Living near the ocean, she is captivated by the endless variation of color and atmosphere that appears each evening. To her, sunsets hold something ethereal, spiritual, and romantic. They are a shared human experience — a moment of beauty witnessed across generations and cultures, linking the present to all who have stood beneath the same fading light.
Since childhood, she has made a quiet ritual of pausing to watch the setting sun whenever possible. Today, she photographs sunsets almost daily, selecting images that resonate most strongly and using them as starting points for her paintings. Through artistic interpretation, she enhances color, mood, and sensation, aiming not to replicate the scene but to preserve the feeling of awe it evokes.
Her hope is that these works carry that sense of wonder forward — offering joy, calm, and emotional resonance to those who encounter them.
Alongside these atmospheric works of sunsets, Shelley has also developed a series of small paintings that originate from her doodles. These spontaneous forms arise almost unconsciously, often while she is on the phone or lost in thought. Shapes and colors emerge intuitively, without planning or narrative, existing somewhere between abstraction and subconscious expression. Though difficult to explain, these works have resonated strongly with viewers, suggesting that their appeal lies in the same instinctive visual language from which they are born.
The Current Horizon
At this stage in her life and practice, Shelley Rygg describes her work as deeply intuitive, yet informed by years of close looking and study. Through extensive travel across Europe, she has visited many of the world’s major museums, carefully observing techniques, subjects, and artistic approaches. These experiences became a quiet education — a process of absorbing what resonated, what endured, and what moved her, shaping her visual instincts over time.
This period marks a meaningful moment of emergence. Shelley sees her current body of work as a distinct chapter — a standalone phase that reflects where she is now, both creatively and personally. Her intention is simple yet profound: to share her art widely, to see it live in the world beyond her studio, and to know that it brings positive feeling into the lives of others.
She hopes viewers encounter in her work a sense of calm, peace, awe, and dreamlike reflection. While her themes may continue to evolve, her deeper aim remains consistent — to offer moments that lift the viewer beyond the routines of daily life and into something more expansive and contemplative.
Exhibiting in community-centered “third spaces” holds special meaning in this stage of her journey. Places such as neighborhood cafés and gathering spaces create a more immediate and human connection between art and daily life, allowing artwork to be encountered naturally rather than only within formal gallery settings. For Shelley, showing work in these environments represents both accessibility and possibility — a way of sharing art within the rhythm of real community life. She sees these opportunities as a joyful beginning and hopes they lead to many more ways of connecting with audiences.
Looking ahead, Shelley envisions continuing to paint while exploring how her work might grow in depth and resonance. She carries a quiet but sincere dream of artistic greatness — not as prestige alone, but as the ability to create work that tells a story and holds lasting meaning. Success, for her, is tied to that pursuit, though she also allows herself to imagine ambitious milestones, such as a solo exhibition in New York City.
For now, she remains committed to the process — to painting, evolving, and following where intuition leads.
Entering the Public Sphere
This inaugural exhibition with Sector Seven Contemporary Art Gallery (S7CAG) marks the first major step in Shelley Rygg’s public presentation of her work and signals her evolution into a full-time artistic practice. Through S7CAG’s network of thoughtfully curated third spaces, her artwork will reach a broad and diverse audience across South Pasadena, Pasadena, and Santa Monica, presented in community-oriented environments where art becomes part of everyday life. Her work will rotate through these locations over the coming months, allowing it to be experienced in multiple settings and contexts.
The current group exhibition, opening February 15 at Jones Coffee Roasters in Pasadena, represents Rygg’s long-awaited first public showing and artist reception — a meaningful debut that invites both new viewers and longtime supporters to experience her work firsthand. S7CAG is honored to support and present this significant milestone in Shelly Rygg’s artistic journey.