Ella Kuzyk has been making art since she could reach her baby hands into a jar of paint. Raised in the mountains of California, Nevada, and Washington, Ella has a deep and fiery passion for the outdoors. Through high school she nurtured that passion through cross country running and Nordic skiing. When an injury shut down her competitive career and college plans, she made the decision to move to Bozeman.

Since moving to Bozeman, Ella has rediscovered many ways to reconnect with the mountains—a connection she had lost under the pressures of competition. Namely, her passion for art has flourished over the last few years. Art goes hand in hand with long trail runs, days skiing in the backcountry, and nights spent under the stars. Life became less about performing, and more about living joyfully!

Ella’s art focuses on the experience and process; blending the memory, imagination, and place together. When painting, she usually starts drawing based on reference photos, then lets loose with the colors, letting her experience of the place shine through. This gives her art a bit of a psychedelic edge. I find the first sentence a bit confusing.. think she means a particular experience: I’d say, Ella’s art process focuses on a particular experience, blending memory, imagination and place together.

Ella is on a mission to communicate the unfathomable wonder and indescribable relationships found at the intersection of the human experience and the natural world.

In her fourth year at MSU, Ella is finishing up a marketing degree. You can follow her adventures and life as a landscape artist on Instagram @january.dreaming.