As an atmospheric landscape painter, Victoria Veedell’s works are luminous and contemplative, revealing a deep inspiration from nature and the challenge of capturing its essence in paint.
“Artists like J.M.W. Turner, especially his late works, and Monet, with his devotion to painting the same scene in shifting light and color, have been strong influences. Their approaches encouraged me to explore the emotional qualities of light and the subtle, ever-changing palette of the natural world,” Veedell told 48hills.
Living in Lower Pacific Heights for the past 20 years, Veedell has had seven studios around the city, in Dogpatch, SoMa, the Mission, and Bayview, and currently works at one in the Hunters Point Shipyard. Veedell says she loves how welcoming the Bay Area art community is and how easy it is to connect across different groups of artists.
“It feels like a small, supportive network where people share resources and help each other succeed. I stay connected through organizations like ArtSpan and the Northern California Women’s Caucus For Art, which foster a real sense of belonging. I believe everyone can find their community here,” she said.
Veedell grew up in Houston, and completed her BFA at Texas A & M in Corpus Christi. In 1990, she returned to Houston to work in an art gallery and as a studio assistant to several artists. After 35 years as a painter, she now recalls how her focus on the landscape began the summer after college, when she studied in France with Ted Seth Jacobs at L’Ecole Albert Defois.
“That experience solidified my desire to make the natural world my subject. Back in Houston, I created a series of pastel works inspired by the gardens along the Azalea Trail—more traditional in approach, but the foundation for everything that followed. Over time, my work loosened and became less about literal representation and more about atmosphere, memory, and the emotional qualities of light,” Veedell said.
In 1994, she moved to New York City to attend graduate school at NYU, but discovered that the program wasn’t the right fit and was too expensive. She began working in a Soho gallery and painting nights and weekends in her studio in the Meatpacking District. Veedell stayed in New York for seven years before moving to Japan in 2001 with her partner, who took a job there. In Tokyo, she painted full time while traveling throughout Asia.
During this time, she also participated in her first artist residencies at Vermont Studio Center and Chitraniketan artist residency in Kerala, India. In 2003, her partner was transferred to San Francisco, where they’ve since built a life together, marrying and raising a daughter and two dogs.
Regularly attending artist residencies around the globe has profoundly shaped her work as a painter. She notes how these experiences allow her to immerse herself in new environments and study how light shifts, how color behaves, and how atmosphere changes from place to place.
“Each residency opens the door to learning about different cultures and rhythms of life, which subtly find their way into my paintings. They give me something that everyday life rarely allows: uninterrupted time and space to think deeply about painting and to make the work without distraction,” she said.
In these environments, Veedell often creates small series or studies while on-site, which later evolve into larger paintings in her studio. Each residency, in essence, becomes a catalyst for growth.
“I am expanding not only my palette and subject matter, my artistic vocabulary and my sense of possibility, but also my understanding of place, memory, and connection,” she said.
Working primarily in oils on canvas, Veedell prefers the medium for its capacity for building rich layers of color and depth and achieving subtle shifts of light. In fact, she says that while her paintings are rooted in landscape, the real subject is how light transforms it; how color, atmosphere, and memory shape our emotional connection to place.
“I’m not trying to document a specific location so much as to capture the feeling of being there: the quiet stillness at dawn, the warmth before sunset, the shimmer of fog lifting over water. My motivation comes from a desire to create contemplative spaces where viewers can pause, breathe, and reconnect with nature. Each painting becomes both a record of place and a meditation on memory, using light and color as the language to express what’s unseen—the mood, emotion, and passage of time,” she said.
Veedell is a morning person. Days begin with exercise to get energized before heading to her studio by 10 a.m. Her space is large, with four north-facing windows that provide a steady source of natural light, balanced by overhead lighting. It has expansive walls where Veedell hangs multiple works in progress.
“I prefer working directly on the wall rather than an easel, which gives me more support and the freedom to step back and view the paintings at a distance,” she said.
Upon arrival, Veedell takes a few minutes to review notes from the previous day, center herself with a short meditation, and clean and reset her color scheme.
“I typically mix paints for a group of works with similar palettes so I can move fluidly between them, maintaining continuity while minimizing waste. I review my resource photos as reference points, but I also leave space for intuition and memory to guide the process,” she said.
Music fills the mornings, while podcasts or audiobooks accompany her afternoons. Veedell paints for two hours, takes a lunch break, reassesses what needs to be done, then continues painting for a couple more hours.
“I try to reserve all administrative work for one day a week at home, keeping the studio dedicated to creativity,” she said.
Apart from annual residencies (her next will be in Greece in April), Veedell says that exhibitions and gallery representation have also broadened her professional reach and provided the confidence necessary to push her work forward.
“While residencies provide the time and space to take risks and deepen my ideas, exhibiting widely has helped me see how audiences respond to different aspects of my paintings. Today, I’m creating larger, more immersive canvases that invite viewers to step inside moments of stillness, and I feel my career is moving toward projects that engage not only collectors but also broader communities through exhibitions in museums and public spaces,” she said.
In the face of recent events, whether the pandemic, political shifts, or the constant stream of unsettling news, Veedell says she finds herself turning more inward and seeking solace in the landscape. Her work has become a kind of refuge, both for herself as the artist and, she hopes, for those who experience her paintings.
“During the pandemic, I felt incredibly fortunate to have a studio to retreat to. That daily practice of painting became a grounding force, a place where I could process uncertainty and create something restorative. The landscape offered a respite from what felt beyond my control, reminding me of the stillness and resilience of nature,” she said.
These days, Veedell is busy in her studio preparing for two solo shows in 2026, both of which she says are opening up new directions in her work.
“One is centered on stillness and light so I’ve been experimenting with softer transitions of color and layering in ways that feel more meditative. The other is inspired by Northern California’s coastlines and rivers. I’ve been taking long walks and making small studies on site, then translating those impressions into larger canvases back in the studio,” she said.
What excites her most at this juncture is finding how far she can distill a scene while still holding onto the feeling of a place. She’s also been taking on more commissions, adding another dimension to her practice.
“The commissions give me the chance to collaborate closely with clients, weaving their memories or favorite views into paintings that still feel true to my own voice. That exchange between my vision and theirs keeps the work fresh and surprising,” she said.
Throughout these growth spurts, there remains a single question at the core of Veedell’s atmospheric paintings: Why do moments of stillness matter and what can they teach us about our connection to the world around us?
“I’m drawn to the fleeting shifts of light that transform a landscape for just a breath of time, and I want to understand how those moments linger and shape our sense of place. The question extends beyond beauty—it’s about whether quiet contemplation can be a form of resilience in an increasingly fast and uncertain world. Through painting, I’m exploring how we might hold onto these experiences of light and atmosphere, not only as personal memory but as a shared reminder of our interdependence with nature,” she said.
Looking over her career, Veedell feels pleased with how it all worked out. She says she never had a clear map of how things would develop or what success might look like. Yet here she is, still painting, creating, and exhibiting year after year.
“Each season brings new goals and milestones, and that persistence comes as the biggest surprise. I’ve always tended to project my worries into the future, so my younger self might not have believed that I could actually build a career centered on art. The fact that I did, and continue to grow within it, feels both unexpected and affirming,” she said.
Victoria Veedell is represented by Avenue 12 Gallery in San Francisco and Aerena Galleries in Healdsburg. Her solo exhibition, Traces of Light and Stillness, at Olive Hyde Gallery in Fremont will run through March 14. Her work will be included in the San Francisco Art Fair via Arc Gallery at Fort Mason, April 16 to 19. A second solo show, Northern California Light: Witnessing Beauty, Witnessing Change, will be featured at Gualala Art Center in Gualala, CA from June 12 to July 5.
Though travel is a big part of her life, when she is at home, Veedell enjoys quiet days with a good novel or going out to see plays and musicals, which she says keep her connected to other forms of storytelling and creativity. She hopes her paintings offer a calming presence and a lightening of spirit.
“I want viewers to feel invited to slow down, to really look, and to carry that awareness with them when they’re out in nature. Ideally, the work stirs personal memories and creates space for people to place themselves within the landscape,” she said.
To other artists, Victoria Veedell encourages honing an ability to show up for yourself and for others.
“You can’t wait for inspiration to strike, you just have to keep working and it will show up eventually,” she said. “I not only make a million to-do lists but also a ‘done’ list, so I can see the progress I’m making toward my goals. As a visual person, I need to see it to believe it, and that small practice reminds me that each step forward matters.”
For more information, visit her website veedell.com and on Instagram.
