About Crystal Fullerton, the Artist

Learning to draw

Like many other artists out there in this wonderful creative world, I have been doodling, painting and being creative for as long as I can remember. I remember getting called out by my history teacher during a particularly boring lesson on why one group of people wanted to kill another group of people, for being distracted.

"What are you doing?" she yelled across the room at me and I responded

"Art." 

The art at that time was using my pencils to color in the line drawing in my history book to see if I could get it to look hyper-realistic and maybe make it easier to remember or at least fun. Here I am, five decades later and I can't remember the subject or the teacher but I remember how creating that piece of art made me feel.

I am fortunate that my family is full of creative folks. You are either musical or you're a fine artist in my bloodline. Despite my father's best attempts to teach me how to play the bagpipes, and my mothers wish that I play piano and sing, I stuck with my art. I do sing. Loudly and badly, but it gives me great joy and occasionally when the mood hits me or my husband annoys me, I will play the portion of "Scotland the Brave" that I remember on my chanter and watch with evil glee as everyone runs for the hills.

I am the stereotypical horse girl. I drew oodles of horses before I actually owned one. My first horse was a retrained Standardbred mare who taught me a lot about being a horse owner. Many exploits later, the equine dream remains alive and kicking and you'll see so many of my favorite ponies displayed in some form or another. My Appaloosa mare, Chloe, was a favorite muse. You'll see her a lot. When I lost her, it left a big hole in my heart but time moves on and friends and family supported me as I ventured back into the horse world again. It is certainly easy to immerse oneself when you live in the horse capital of Canada: Alberta. This province has me surrounded by quality horseflesh at every turn, and me and my handy dandy camera have been busy snapping everything I see. I invite you to return to this website in the future as you see a decidedly western flair appear in my work.

Through thick and thin, my art has travelled with me. It has journeyed like a free spirit to live in two countries and three provinces, which explains why I have a variety of critters as muses. My art gives me great joy and I hope this website gives you the same enjoyment.

Stay creative!!

(Photo Credit: Layton Photography) (Horse credit: Carmen, thanks to her owners, Tracy & Earl who got me back in the saddle again, and Thanks to Carmen who puts up with my old lady bones!)