About the artist:

Deborah DeWit was born March 28th, 1956 in Portland, Oregon to naturalized Americans. Her mother, father and infant brother arrived by ship in 1950 in San Pedro, California, via South America from Holland. One side of her father's family were etchers, illustrators and painters stretching back several generations in The Hague and grain handlers on the other. On her mother's side of the family were Dutch plantation owners and British traders in the Dutch East Indies, also for several generations. Her father's career in the grain business took her and her family to live in many parts of the U.S. as well as around the world. This varied and somewhat exotic background had a strong influence on Deborah's professional yearnings. Although entering Cornell University as an Agronomy major, the artistic pull of her father's blood and the adventurous streak in her mother's, combined to lead her away from University and set her on a journey to discover her own interests and talents. At the age of fifteen she found that the camera suited her quest and in her twenties set about discovering the world with young eyes recording her travels with image and word. Her photographs received immediate praise and she began the life of a working artist in 1976. Wanting to create as well as discover, Deborah began working in pastel in 1988 and then in oil about a dozen years later. She's been represented by a number of galleries, has sold her work at art fairs, participated in group shows and holds and annual studio show. Her work has been used on book covers, in magazines, in calendars and the originals reside in numerous public and private collections. In 1990 her first husband and business partner Bob Marchant and she created the note card company Simple Minds, later DeWit-Marchant Fine Art & Graphics, featuring her photographs, pastels and oils, with subjects ranging from books to writing letters to cats, and a diverse body of nature oriented imagery. Having enjoyed nationwide distribution, Robert continues to represent DeWit-Marchant Fine Art & Graphics with note cards and reproduction of Deborah's past and ongoing works. Her photographs are also featured on calendars published by Sellers Publishing and her oils and pastels are featured in calendars published by Brush Dance. (see Community page for links to these publishers) Deborah has three books in print: Traveling Light: Chasing and Illuminated Life, a literary memoir about her photographic years; In the Presence of Books, a portfolio of over 40 of her pastels and paintings about reading and the book; and Painting Cats a story of her experience taming a feral cat, named Cabbit, illustrated by her many cat paintings. www.wmjasco.com In 2008-09 Deborah collaborated with her husband, filmmaker Carl Vandervoort, on Wetlands, a documentary about the restoration of a small piece of wild land in the suburban neighborhood where she lived for 25 years and the paintings that are a result of her experiences there. Currently she and her husband Carl are restoring a 1922 house and flower farm on the Oregon coast. Acquired in 2009, they moved there full-time in August of 2011. As progress continues on the house and land, a studio for both Deborah’s and Carl’s work will be completed by the end of 2012. In the meantime, Deborah is exploring new subject matter and ideas, inspired by her new environment. Selected Gallery Exhibition History Sunriver Lodge, Betty Gray Gallery, Sunriver, OR 2010 Rowboat Gallery, Pacific City, OR 2010 Mary Lou Zeek Gallery, Salem, OR 2005, 2006, 2008 Beppu Gallery, Pacific City, OR 2000, 2001, 2002 The Lawrence Gallery, OR: 1981,'82,'83,'84,'88 Gallery at Salishan (formerly Maveety), Gleneden Beach, OR: 1988, '90, '92, '94, '95, '96,'97 The Lisa Harris Gallery, Seattle, WA: 1986, '87, '88, '91, '96 The Augen Gallery, Portland, OR: 1984, '85, '86 Editions Ltd., San Francisco and Indianapolis: 1981,'83, '84, '86, '92 Hanson/Howard Gallery, Ashland, OR: 1987, '91,'93, '96, 2004 American Art Co., Tacoma, WA.: 1984, '94, '95, '96,'98 ArtPaleis Promenade, Den Haag, Netherlands: 1983 Southend-on-Sea, England: 1983 The Silver Image Gallery, Seattle, WA.: 1986 Collections (selected) Nevada Museum of Art, Reno, NV Kaiser Permanente, Portland, OR. Good Samaritan Hospital, Portland, OR. E.F. Hutton, Portland, OR EF Hutton, Portland, OR Arthur Andersen, Seattle, WA Headquarters Co., Seattle and Portland. Intel Corporation, Portland, OR Hewlett Packard, Vancouver, WA St. Louis University US Trust Co., New York, NY Tigard Public Library Publications and Commissions 1984 thru 1992: Twelve fine-art posters published by Editions Ltd, San Francisco, CA. 1986: Commissioned to create two poster images for the Huntington Museum, Pasadena, CA. 1987: Commissioned to create the Salem Art Festival Poster 1989: Featured in the book "Northwest Originals: Oregon Women and Their Art" 1995 thru 2007: 18 covers for Bas Bleu-Bookseller by Post-Atlanta, GA 1994 &1995 & 1997& 1998, 2000,2004: Images used for book covers by Devorss & Co., Marina Del Rey, CA 1997&1999, &2002 & 2004: Cover art for Open Spaces Magazine 1997& 1998: Book Covers for Self-Realization Publishers,Los Angeles, CA 1998: Book Cover for Bedford/St. Martins Press, Boston, MA 1997 thru 2000: Commissioned photographs, drawings and paintings of St.Louis University Environmental Extension Site in Louisiana, MO 1998: Cover Art for Levenger Catalog, Delray Beach, FL 1999: Cover for Orion Magazine, Fall Issue 1999,2001,2002,2003, 2004, 2005, 2006: Calendars for Cedco Publishing, San Rafael, CA 2007-2010: Calendars for Brush Dance and Ronnie Sellers 2001: Kows for Kids Project, Portland, OR "Elsie's Journey"--permanently displayed in Multnomah County Central Library 2001:Five book covers for Penguin Academic Series, Longman Publishing, New York, NY 2002:American Orient Express commission illustrations for their publicity and travel brochures 2003: "Traveling Light: A Photographer's Journey" published by Impassio Press, Seattle WA 2006: "Traveling Light: Chasing an Illuminated Life" re-issue published by William, James & Co., Wilsonville, OR 2006: Tigard Public Library commissions 5' x 8' oil triptych for permanent installation on entry point wall. 2007: "Deborah DeWit Marchant: In the Presence of Books" published by William, James & Co., Wilsonville, OR 2008: "Painting Cats" published by William, James & Co., Wilsonville, OR 2010: Wetlands , a documentary about art and the environment, produced by Carl Vandervoort and Deborah DeWit Teaching and Jurying Experience 1982-83: Artist-in-Residence, Sitka Center for Art and Ecology 1983, 1988 thru 1991, 2000, '01,'02, '03, '04:Photography and Pastel Workshops, Sitka Center for Art and Ecology, Otis, OR 1987-'88: Photography Workshop, Salem Art Association 1986, '87: Guest Lecturer, Oregon State University 1989: Juror, ArtQuake Festival, Marketplace, Portland, Or. 1991: Juror, Salem Art Fair, 2-D entrants 1999, 2004: Pastel workshop-Oregon College of Arts and Crafts, Portland, Oregon 2007 Juror, Art in the Pearl, Portland, OR 2007 Board of Directors , Sitka Center for Art and Ecology 2008 The Presence of Books Workshop Lewis and Clark College with poet Kim Stafford Best of Show awarded by the Salt Lake City Gallery Association, Utah Arts Festival 1997 Best of Show awarded by the Board of Art in the Pearl, Portland, Oregon 1999 Honorary Chair and Featured Artist of the Ninth Annual Sitka Art Invitational, Portland, Oregon, 2001 Curator and Logistics Chair for Sitka Art Invitational: 2002-6, 2008-10 Governor's Office Exhibit, Salem, Oregon July 2006