The Power of Vulnerability: René Romero Schuler on Painting Strength, Healing, and the Human Spirit

In this intimate and deeply personal episode, internationally acclaimed painter and sculptor René Romero Schuler opens up about her extraordinary journey through art, resilience, and emotional truth. Known for her evocative figurative works that embody both fragility and strength, René shares the raw and real stories that shaped her creative path — from overcoming personal struggles to finding empowerment through her brush and sculpting tools. Join us as we explore how art can become a vessel for healing, identity, and human connection. This conversation dives into themes of vulnerability, transformation, and the beauty of imperfection, revealing how René continues to redefine what it means to be both artist and woman in today’s creative world. Whether you’re an artist, collector, or simply someone seeking inspiration, this episode invites you to feel, reflect, and rediscover the power of self-expression through René’s lens.

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American painter and sculptor René Romero Schuler creates powerful images that speak to the complexities of the human condition and the spirit that connects all human beings. René did not have any formal art training but since a small child felt that she was always meant to be an artist. She endured a difficult childhood and those real life challenges are imbued in her work illustrating her appreciation for the struggles and triumphs of humanity. René was born in Chicago in 1968 to parents Maryanne, a retired nurse and Rocky, who René describes as a bit of an enigma, though always in sales. René and her siblings grew up in Chicago, though she spent a year and a half in Quito with her grandparents. By time she reached her teenage years her home life was becoming difficult with a troubled relationship with her mother and an intrusive fear of her father. At the age of 14 René ran away from home and lived rough pulling on all her resources and determination. She eventually found work as an artist, painting murals in commercial properties. When she was 17 René moved into her own apartment and worked a variety of jobs from waitressing to bartending. By collaborating with a variety of artists around Chicago, René was gradually becoming a full-time artist with her own studio and plenty of commissions. In 1999 she met her future husband and for a while the couple lived in New York before René was drawn back to Chicago to focus on her art. It was here that she was able to reconnect with her contacts in art galleries and establish herself as a professional artist. René is represented by galleries across the U.S., Canada and Europe, She has had major exhibitions throughout the U.S., Europe and Asia, and has work included in the permanent collections of numerous museums and institutions. René now lives in Monterrey, CA with her husband Rick and two sons Ian and Owen.

Rene’s links: 
https://www.reneromeroschuler.com/ 
https://www.instagram.com/reneromeroschuler/

Some favorite female artists:
Maryann Kolb
Kelly Reemsten
Bisa Butler
Joan Brown
Annie Leibovitz
Tamara de Lempicka
Helen Frankenthaler
Louise Bourgeois
Tracey Emin 

Host: Chris Stafford
Produced by Hollowell Studios
Follow @theaartpodcast on Instagram
The AART Podcast on YouTube
Email: [e-mail] 

Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/women-unscripted--4769409/support.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
I am Renee Romero Schuler and I'm a painter and
sculptor based in Monterey, California. I just had a total
meltdown one day working on a painting and just not
connecting with it and not feeling like it was good enough.
And I needed to, you know, go inside the house

(00:22):
and take care of Ian or whatever. And I just
had a bad day in the studio and we're in
the garage as it was, but I took all the
paint off my palette and just scraped it all over
the painting, and yeah, just an anger. It was pure anger.

Speaker 2 (00:40):
Hello, and welcome to Art the podcast where we get
to know women from around the world of visual arts.
I'm Chris Stafford and this is season three, Episode four.
My guest this week is the American painter and sculptor
Renee Romero Schuler, who, in her words, creates powerful images

(01:03):
that speak to the complexities of the human condition and
the spirit that connects all human beings. Renee did not
have any formal art training, but since a small child,
felt that she was always meant to be an artist.
She endured a difficult childhood and those real life challenges
are imbued in her work. Illustrating her appreciation for the

(01:26):
struggles and triumphs of humanity. Renee was born in Chicago
in nineteen sixty eight to parents Marie Anne, a retired nurse,
and Rocky, who Renee describes as a bit of enigma,
was always in sales. Renee and her sisters grew up
in Chicago, although she spent a year and a half

(01:46):
in Quito with her grandparents. By the time she reached
her teenage years, her home life was becoming difficult, with
a troubled relationship with her mother and an intrusive fear
of her father. At the age of fourteen, Renee ran
away from home and lived rough, Pulling on all her
resources and determination, she eventually found work as an artist,

(02:09):
painting murals in commercial properties. When she was seventeen, Renee
moved into her own apartment and worked a variety of jobs,
from waitressing to bartending. By collaborating with a variety of
artists around Chicago, Renee was gradually becoming a full time
artist with her own studio and plenty of commissions. In

(02:31):
nineteen ninety nine, she met her future husband, and for
a while the couple lived in New York. Before Renee
was drawn back to Chicago to focus on her art.
It was here that she was able to reconnect with
her contacts in art galleries and establish herself as a
professional artist. Renee is now represented by galleries across the US, Canada,

(02:53):
and Europe. She has had major exhibitions throughout the US, Europe,
and Asia, and has worked included in the permanent collections
of numerous museums and institutions. Renee now lives in Monterey, California,
with her husband Rick and two sons, Ian and Owen. Renee.
Welcome to the podcast. Thank you for taking time.

Speaker 1 (03:14):
To do this, Thank you for having me.

Speaker 2 (03:17):
Are you a big podcast fan?

Speaker 1 (03:20):
You know, I'm not. I tend to listen to music
more than podcasts, and you know, occasionally listening to books
on Audible and that sort of thing. I like stories
more than reality, I suppose. So, yeah, I would say
I listened to those more. But but I've listened to

(03:41):
dumb podcasts yours included, and I like them. I like
them very much. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (03:48):
So, but you prefer to have the music coming when
you work, so do you always have music?

Speaker 1 (03:53):
Pretty much? Yeah? It's either that or silence, I suppose.

Speaker 2 (03:58):
Yeah, I know, for myself. You know, if I pray opera,
for example, I am that much more physical. I'm wondering
what it does to you.

Speaker 1 (04:09):
I kind of use the music to hold me in
a time and space. So I sort of start the
morning with a bit of meditation and that helps me
to just hap into my energy and close out all
the fluff that's going on in my mind. And once
I zero in on that energy, I start mixing a

(04:30):
color and that's usually going to be the background for
whatever I'm going to work on that day, and that,
you know, it'll sort of drive me to a story,
usually something from my own life, my past or whatever.
And then you know, a song will often come to

(04:52):
me and so I'll kind of create a playlist from
there and it helps to sort of hold my energy,
you know, steady, and.

Speaker 2 (05:00):
You'll stay with that genre of music then throughout that
session in the studio. Yeah, yeah, that's interesting. Are you
a musician yourself? Do you play anything?

Speaker 1 (05:11):
Do you sing guitar? But you know, I know some chords,
I'm not very good.

Speaker 2 (05:18):
Are you a private singer?

Speaker 1 (05:19):
Then? I love to sing. My husband usually just makes
fun of me if I sing too loud though, though, Yeah,
so maybe I'm not as good as I think I am.

Speaker 2 (05:35):
We're all a star in our own car, aren't we?

Speaker 1 (05:38):
Absolutely?

Speaker 2 (05:40):
Yeah, And you have two boys as well as your
husband Rick. You have two boys, and and they're of
an age probably they feel very particular about what they
listen to in the car. So if you if you're
out as a family, who gets to choose what's playing
in the car?

Speaker 1 (05:55):
Oh Ian is the alpha in the family. He's always the.

Speaker 2 (06:01):
And he's the older of the two boys.

Speaker 1 (06:04):
Yeah, And you know, interestingly, though they both love music,
I think Owen loves music even more and I happen
to like pretty much any genre, so I can relate
really well to both boys when they put on their playlist.

(06:26):
But I think Owen and I are a little bit
more alike in the style of music that we like.

Speaker 2 (06:33):
And how about your husband Rick, does he have a
say in this in the playlist?

Speaker 1 (06:38):
He wants to, but if he ends around, it's hard
for anyone. But but yeah, Rick has his own you know,
he likes a lot of classic rock, and he tends
to like a lot of newer stuff like what I
like as well too.

Speaker 2 (06:58):
And both of your are artistic as well. You told
me so where did they get that from?

Speaker 1 (07:04):
There?

Speaker 2 (07:05):
Your mom was also and you have an uncle and
that was artistic. Tell me about the art in the family.

Speaker 1 (07:11):
Well, yeah, my mom when we were little, she painted
murals on our walls and those were really special. And
you know, she's clearly very talented, and she's always loved
arts and crafts and that sort of thing. And I
had an uncle who's just a few years older than me,

(07:32):
but he was a great artist, and when I was
really little, he used to teach me how to draw,
and he probably influenced me even more. And I don't know.
From such a young age, I just knew I was
an artist, So I'm thinking my uncle Nelson probably had

(07:54):
the most influence on that.

Speaker 2 (07:57):
So, you know, we go back right to the beginning
to tell your story. Now, yours started in Chicago. You
were born in nineteen sixty eight in Chicago. Tell me
about your very earliest memories.

Speaker 1 (08:09):
Oh, gosh, my earliest memories. Well, Chicago was very different
back in the late sixties. We had an apartment and
we lived upstairs from my grandparents, who are from Ecuador,
or were from Ecuador. They've passed, but my grandfather worked

(08:32):
for Standard Oil and I think he was an accountant
and that's what brought my father to the United States
and how he met my mom. But anyway, my parents
were still teenagers when they had my older sister and me,
and so my mom's parents were taking care of my

(08:55):
older sister, Gina, and my dad's parents were taking care
of me. So when my grandfather got transferred back to Quito,
they took me with them. But I was I think
at that time, I was four and a half maybe
five years old when they took me to Ecuador, And yeah,

(09:16):
I was already speaking Spanish, so that was pretty seamless
for me. And I went to school in Ecuador.

Speaker 2 (09:24):
So you're Spanish then you learnt from your grandparents. And
did your mother, Mary Anne, she was a nurse and
retired now of course, but did she speak Spanish?

Speaker 1 (09:37):
No, you know, she didn't, and my father didn't want
Spanish spoken in the house. He only you know, this
is very common I think among immigrants, her first generation immigrants,
but you know, they just want to seem American, They
want to you know, yeah, they sort of deny their
culture a little bit. And I think that's how my

(09:59):
dad was. He's kind of come full circle with it now,
but but yeah, back then. You know, so when I
came back from Ecuador, I was in second grade, and
you know, I was not allowed to speak Spanish in
the house.

Speaker 2 (10:12):
And do you speaking with your boys as well? Do
you teach them?

Speaker 1 (10:16):
I tried to. By the time Ian was three, he
just raised his finger and kind of wagged it back
and forth and just said, mommy, no. And that was
I was, you know, speaking almost exclusively in Spanish to
both of them. And Ian had a little bit longer
of that than Owen did. But you know, I think

(10:39):
Rick does not speak any Spanish. And I think when
you know, your kids see you communicating with your spouse
in a language, that's the language they're going to stick with.
And I think they were like, you know, why are
you talking to me like this?

Speaker 2 (10:56):
You know, no, understand. Tell me a little bit about
your time in Ecuador then that you went to school there,
so what were your memories and was it a fun experience?
Did you enjoy it?

Speaker 1 (11:10):
I think I did enjoy it. I you know, my
grandparents were wonderful and I yeah, the lifestyle, the culture,
everything about it was so different. Interesting things that I
remember are just you know, being a girl it was
very clear that I was, you know, that girls are

(11:33):
being raised to take care of the men and so culturally,
coming back to the United States and having things be
quite different was a bit of a shock and hard
to sort of make heads or tails of when I
came back. But you know, that was one thing that

(11:53):
I remember is, you know, I need to write, you know,
beautifully and cursive, and I need to always, you know,
make sure the man of the house is well cared for,
and you know, the foods on the table and all
that kind of stuff. And yeah, it was very different
coming back to the United States and having my mom
working full time and going to school, and you know,

(12:16):
my dad was you know, an interesting character himself. But
I just grew up differently than my sisters did, and
it was hard to reconcile.

Speaker 2 (12:28):
Was your mother teaching you sort of domestic chores, you know,
like sewing and cooking and that sort of thing, things
that you expected to apply, you know, in such a
patriarchy teaching.

Speaker 1 (12:39):
No, my mom did not. She was very busy. She yeah,
like I said, she was working full time as a nurse.
Her hours, you know, her shift would change. Sometimes she
worked at night, overnight, sometimes during the day and then
she was also still in school, you know, early on,
so she was just very busy. And you know, back then,

(13:01):
cooking you know involved like Swanson TV dinners and you
know Campbell's soup and yeah, just not good stuff. I
you know, looking back, I don't think I thought she
was the greatest cook, because she was, you know, probably
always in a hurry, and you know, we pretty much
kind of had to fend for ourselves. So I loved

(13:23):
TV dinners that was Those were great for me. And
you know, but she did cook occasionally, like I had
some favorite things she used to make, I suppose, but
uh yeah, not too often.

Speaker 2 (13:40):
What do you feel that you did learn from your
mother then, if you learned art from your grandparents, well,
what did you learn from your mother?

Speaker 1 (13:48):
My mom and I did not have that grade of
a relationship, so I can't say I learned a lot
of things back then. She did teach me how to crochet, though,
and I I still croche now, you know, not often,
but I love it and that's a sweet memory. But yeah,

(14:09):
we didn't really get along as I when I grew up.
We're close now, but it took a long, long long
time for us to get here, and that was unfortunate.

Speaker 2 (14:23):
Looking back, what do you think were the hurdles for
your younger self?

Speaker 1 (14:28):
You know, I think both of my parents did the
best that they could with the tools that they had.
I think they were just really young, and I think
it took me a long time to come to terms
with that. You know, I think when you have a

(14:49):
tough childhood and you know, things hurt you along the way,
I think you tend to point fingers and judge and
hold on to a lot of anger and that sort
of thing. It took me a long time to look
back on it with some perspective and just accept that.
You know, they didn't do anything out of malice. You know,

(15:13):
they were just struggling and it hurt a lot. That
they did the best that they could, So that just
I think once you can get to that point, you're
just a much happier person. So I feel pretty good. Now.

Speaker 2 (15:29):
Tell me a little bit more about your father, Rocky.
You called him an enigma.

Speaker 1 (15:35):
That's because, yeah, he's he's an interesting guy. I mean,
he's you know, my sister and I kind of joke
we all do really like nobody ever really knows what
he does for a living. You know, he's just uh,

(15:58):
he's got a good heart and he's a good kind
person now, but yeah, we just don't really know how
he gets by.

Speaker 2 (16:10):
So he wasn't a nine to five guy then.

Speaker 1 (16:14):
You know, when I was really young, he was. He
did have jobs back then, and he was in sales.
He sold like mainframe computers, you know, for like IBM
or something like that. But he didn't really stick with
any jobs for that long.

Speaker 2 (16:34):
So what kind of things did you do with your dad?
If you hung out with them, did you do sport
or go on adventures with him?

Speaker 1 (16:43):
Gosh, I don't think we ever really hung out with him.
I think we kind of hid from him more than anything.

Speaker 2 (16:51):
Yeah, did you fear him? Oh yeah, that must have
been hard.

Speaker 1 (16:57):
Yeah, it was tough. How if you.

Speaker 2 (17:00):
Reconcile with that experience now as an adult?

Speaker 1 (17:05):
Oh well, like you know, like I said, I think,
you know, you know, having had kids of my own,
I think all of us just bring our own experiences
to the table. And you know, I don't think that
that's you know, I don't think you can make excuses
for bad behavior, But I think you bring the tools

(17:29):
that you have, and some of that comes from you know,
a dysfunctional place. And I would say that that would
be the case for my dad and even for my
mom and in a lot of ways. And I can
say that for myself too, because you know, I had
a lot of trauma and a lot of challenges along
the way, and that's what I brought into being a

(17:50):
mother myself. And you know, you can only do the
best you can, and sometimes it just comes out all wrong.
And I would say, you know, my dad, he had
a lot of his own trauma growing up, and he,
you know, he drank too much. He you know, smoked

(18:14):
a lot of hot and he just was, you know,
he wasn't right in the head, and he just kind
of took stuff out on people and hurt people. And
you know, I don't think, you know, he wasn't a
mean person. He didn't you know, come into the house
thinking I'm going to hurt people. You know, he just

(18:37):
lost his temper a lot.

Speaker 2 (18:40):
And so what was your escape then? Was it school?
Was it friends that you could go and play with?

Speaker 1 (18:46):
Escaping was tough, but yeah, I so we moved around
a lot. So friends were also a challenge growing up.
But you know, by the time I was eight I
started trying to run away from home, and I would
usually get found and brought back, and that wasn't very pleasant. Then,

(19:12):
you know, going into like junior high and high school,
that became more common. And then you know, I left
home pretty early. I just I just didn't go back.

Speaker 2 (19:26):
Did you have anyone you could turn to?

Speaker 1 (19:28):
Not really, So I did a lot of wandering. I
used to go into art galleries around Chicago, you know,
during the day. I got really good at finding places
where I could you know, stay warm or stay cool
depending on the season, and places to sleep. I didn't

(19:49):
really tap into shelters or anything like that, but every
once in a while I would stay with friends. You know,
they would steak me into their houses or their parents
would let them have me over, or you know, there
was one guy who would sneak me into his basement
and I slept under his bed for you know, probably
about six months or so. So I you know, I

(20:14):
think there were only maybe two times where I actually
slept outside. Other than that, you know, if I needed
a yeah, like at night, I would look for unlocked
cars and I would sleep in the cars and stuff
like that. So I was pretty resourceful and.

Speaker 2 (20:35):
What ages were you at that time?

Speaker 1 (20:38):
Oh gosh, it varied. There were you know, periods, and
sometimes I would try to go back home, so anywhere
from fourteen on. I had my own apartment filled by
the time I was seventeen something like that.

Speaker 2 (20:55):
And were your parents looking for you, Renee during this time?

Speaker 1 (21:00):
You know, not really. I mean at one point, my
mom and my sister did track me down, you know,
and I never understood why. You know, like my mom
never seemed to want me around, and so I was
I felt like it was pretty ironic, and in the
end I was right. So yeah, no, I think they

(21:21):
were probably glad I was gone. At least I felt
that way at the time.

Speaker 2 (21:24):
But how about your relationship with your siblings. Your two siblings,
Gina and Tanna, tell us about your relationship with them.

Speaker 1 (21:33):
Tanya was always the you know, the protector. She would
try to get between my father and me. Tanya was
always very much into trying to hold the family together.
And yeah, she was just she was. She was very strong,

(21:54):
I thought, and you know, Gina went in a different direction.
She had a lot of struggles of her own. And
you know, all three of us were very close. We
you know, we were only twenty months apart. Tanya and
me Gina and I were six are sixteen months apart. Yeah,

(22:17):
so we were very close with one another.

Speaker 2 (22:19):
And how about now, I know you lost Tanya in
twenty sixteen. That must have been pretty traumatic too for you.

Speaker 1 (22:29):
It was probably the worst thing ever. Yeah, how did
you cope? It wasn't easy. I think it's something you know,
people say time heals, It really doesn't. It's absolutely not true.

(22:51):
Kind of interesting to put that theory to the test.
But yeah, you know, losing anyone you love that much
so suddenly and unexpectedly is something very hard to reconcile with.
And you know, knowing that she took her own life,

(23:13):
and you know, every time I look up at a
perfect blue sky, I I fall apart. I think Tanya
should be here. And you know, it's one of the
hardest things to ever conceive of. And you know, I've

(23:37):
I've been if anybody was going to do that, I
always thought it would be me. And honestly, I thought
that my heart should just stop on its own because
I was hurting so much. It was so unexpected that
it would have been Tanya. And honestly, you know, she
did that when she was forty five, and you know,

(24:00):
at that point, I was like, Okay, you know, we've
we've kind of made it. You know, we got past
all this stuff, and you know, now we can live
a life. But unfortunately, Tanya's struggles really carried well into
you know, those years. And but yeah, I thought she

(24:20):
was okay, and I didn't realize she wasn't.

Speaker 2 (24:25):
Well, especially given that she as when she was younger.
You considered her strong. Oh yeah, and you'll protect her.

Speaker 1 (24:33):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (24:34):
Did she leave family behind, children?

Speaker 1 (24:37):
Yeah, she had a daughter, my niece, Kira.

Speaker 2 (24:42):
And so with those kind of experiences, you know, they
shape us permanently, of course, and as an artist, they
influence our art. How do you think those early formative
days and the difficult childhood and the trauma have really
shape the course of your art? Not specifically pieces, Renee,

(25:05):
I'm just thinking about how you decided to make art,
you know, your livelihood now and what particular shape or
form that was taking in your mind.

Speaker 1 (25:19):
Well, I think that, you know, I needed to make
a living. I needed to figure out how I was
going to get by, and you know, I had to
drop out of high school because I needed to work.
I needed to figure out how to pay my bills
and that sort of thing. And the only thing I

(25:43):
really felt that I excelled at, you know, in high
school was art. It was the only thing I really
felt passionate about and enjoyed. And I don't know that
I have any true innate skill or you know, great
talent of any I just loved it, and so I had.

(26:06):
I had a lot of tenacity I think I still do,
and I just I just pushed, you know, and I
went around and asked companies if they wanted paintings for
their offices and that sort of thing, and some of
them said yes. And that's how I got my start.
I was just out of high school and started doing

(26:27):
paintings for companies.

Speaker 2 (26:30):
So you were seventeen years old then, and you had
your own apartment and this was, you know, paying the rent.
I guess now you were starting to be self sufficient.

Speaker 1 (26:39):
Yeah, well that was that was the career direction I
was going in. But I was also waitressing to make
ends meet and that sort of thing, so early on
I had to do a few things.

Speaker 2 (26:51):
Yes, well I'm thinking that too, you know, it always
goes alongside something else. What were those things apart from waitressing?
Give us some idea of the kind of things you
were doing to make ends meet.

Speaker 1 (27:03):
I waitressed early on. I worked at a record store
as well, and then I graduated into being a bartender
at nightclubs and that was great because I made a
lot of money back then.

Speaker 2 (27:20):
And this was all in Chicago.

Speaker 1 (27:22):
Yeah, so, and then, you know, working in the nightclubs
and restaurant industry Chicago. You know, they call it the
biggest small town, and it really is. It's a very
tight community. So I became pretty well known for doing
decorative painting for restaurants and nightclubs around Chicago. So I
did some really cool work for some really well known

(27:45):
clubs back then, and so that I was able to
stop bartending and waitressing and that sort of thing by
the time I was twenty three and just exclusively do
my art for these clubs and restaurants. And it was
fun because I was making a living with a paintbrush

(28:07):
in my hand, and I certainly couldn't complain. But it
was all commission work. So you know, if they wanted
a wall to look like Marble, that's what I did.
If they wanted a mural that, you know, resembled Caravaggio,
or whatever. I would do that, you know. So I
would create these very heavy, theme oriented faces. And I

(28:30):
worked with some really great, great artists along the way.
So even though I don't have a formal, you know,
academic education, I would argue I've had the greatest education
that money didn't buy. I really worked with some tremendous
talent along the way and learned skills that they absolutely

(28:54):
do not teach in any colleges that I've been aware of.

Speaker 2 (29:01):
You must have developed a confidence then that in your
ability and to take the pressure of commissions at a
young age then knowing that you know you could produce
the goods.

Speaker 1 (29:12):
Yeah, yeah, you know. And I wouldn't back then, I
would definitely not characterize myself as confident. I don't know
if I still you know, but it's not a word
I use, really, I think I just, you know, early on,
when I was calling those companies, I was scared to death.

(29:35):
I mean, one person said they wanted a wall that
looked like malakite, and I was like, well, what is malakite?
You know, how am I going to do that? And
you know, so I would go to the Chicago Public Library.
I would check out books and I would study all night.
I would get you know, boards and paints and I
would just play and try and figure it out. Another

(29:58):
person wanted a trump law. I was like, what's a
trump way? You know. They wanted it to be a
garden that they could step into on their lunch break.
They wanted the whole wall downe like that. And I
was like, oh my god, I don't know how to
do that. And you know, my answer to literally everything
anyone said yes, absolutely I could do that. I couldn't

(30:19):
do any of it. And so I had to practice
and really try to figure it out. And thankfully that worked.
And when I really didn't think there was any possible
way I was going to be able to nail this,
I had other friends that were artists and I'm like, okay,
do you know how to paint like Carvagio? And you know,
I you know, I had a friend David. He's like, yes, absolutely,
I can help you with that. And so we'd work

(30:41):
together and we'd split the money and I learned from him,
you know, And so I was learning from everybody that
I would bring into projects with me. So you know,
I was like the broker. I was finding these jobs
for us and we would do them, and we'd do
them together and we created some amazing things. Amazing things

(31:02):
we did, you know, massive relief sculptures that flanked doorways,
We did you know, the walls that were you know,
like oh gosh, darn it, I can't remember the term.
But we you know, we did murals out of plaster,
mimicking the Dead Sea scrolls. We just did anything. It

(31:26):
is crazy the stuff we did. And gilding. We gilded
barrel vaulted ceilings that were you know, nine hundred square feet. Wow. Yeah, yeah, you.

Speaker 2 (31:39):
Were tremendously resourceful then.

Speaker 1 (31:41):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (31:42):
No, you you know, you were given a job to do.
When you done well, found out how you were going
to do it.

Speaker 1 (31:48):
Yeah, I would say that's the better word. Confident. No,
I was like constantly terrified that I was going to fail.
But I just kept pushing and you know, pushing, push, pushing,
and trying to figure things out.

Speaker 2 (32:05):
Where do you think the turning point came?

Speaker 1 (32:07):
Then?

Speaker 2 (32:08):
Once you established yourself, when you were learning in the
process how to produce whatever you were asked of and
as you say, intimidated by it because you didn't always
have the answers you had to research them. But at
one point you must have felt, Okay, I'm good, this
is this is something I can do when I have
the confidence to do it. Do you remember that turning
point or is it gradual?

Speaker 1 (32:30):
I think it was pretty gradual. Yeah, I you know,
I think I was intimidated by a lot of projects,
probably most of them. But you know, like I said,
I'm really really tenacious. I just keep, you know, pushing
myself forward. And I never really left any time for
myself to absorb failure. You know, there were a lot

(32:57):
of there were a lot of no's along the way.
There were a lot of things that challenged me a
great deal. And I did have failures and I did
learn from them. But I couldn't allow myself any time
to sit and wallow in misery because there was always
a bill to be paid or you know, something around

(33:20):
the corner. So I just kept going forward.

Speaker 2 (33:24):
I would imagine Chicago as a city and when it
comes to art would have been a pretty tough nut
to crack. So your tenacity would have meant everything to
your survival.

Speaker 1 (33:35):
Yeah, and it was a great city to do what
I was doing in. You know, I survived pretty well
pretty quickly. You know, the earlier years were really tough
and painful. But by the time I stopped bartending and waitressing,
I was pretty solid and what I did. And you know,

(33:58):
you're you're still well, you know, when you're doing those
kinds of things, you're working on one project at a time,
and so you know, you have to always hope that
there's another project around the corner, and there's that fear
that you know, oh gosh, what if there isn't you know,
because I wasn't making money hand over fist. I was
making enough, that's it, you know, So I don't know

(34:22):
a turning point. I think I felt pretty solid in
what I was doing by the time I was twenty three.
I would say, yeah, but you know, I wasn't doing
my own art. I was doing it, you know, kind
of just at home and not feeling particularly confident in

(34:43):
my own skills, my own you know, personal vision, and
my own connection to any style or method or you know,
anything like that. So I was getting through the these jobs,
but I was also beating myself up pretty badly along
the way because of that.

Speaker 2 (35:06):
You mentioned that you work with a lot of notable artists.
Give us some names.

Speaker 1 (35:11):
Oh, most notable would be Ray Pisca and he owned
company in Chicago. They did designing and building of restaurants
and nightclubs, so you know, kind of a turnkey sort
of a thing. But Ray is I think the most
talented person I've ever known. There's nothing he can't do,

(35:37):
any type of you know, style of painting. He exposed
me to all the materials that I'm so familiar with,
and really how to improvise when you don't have what
you need. And that's a really incredible skill that there's
no way to learn that unless you're out there doing

(35:58):
And so when we were working together, we worked together
for several years, and you know, I was doing everything
from you know, stick welding ie beams to massive sculptural
elements and murals that were enormous, and you know, using

(36:20):
everything from automotive lackers to epoxy resins and latex paints
and whatever, all kinds of things. So that was probably
the greatest experience that I had in terms of just
learning and learning and learning.

Speaker 2 (36:40):
So where were you working out of? Now, wasn't just
your apartment? Was it with you using all those materials?

Speaker 1 (36:47):
No? I only think when did I I got a studio?
I can't remember what years, I started having separate locations
and I bought a van like so we could carry
all our materials to jobs and that sort of thing. So, yeah,
I had a separate location early on. It was just

(37:08):
out of my apartment and that was at the time
when I was working on you know, just the smaller
projects for offices and that sort of thing. But yeah,
I had a studio.

Speaker 2 (37:20):
How was your social life at that time, Renee, I mean,
did you have when you had time. You're obviously working
hard in those early years to get established, but did
you have any social life?

Speaker 1 (37:31):
What was that? Like? I'm not much social life, you know,
I've never been a big drinker or partier per se.
So for me, it was really cool to have those
bartending years because it was you know, my friends would
all come see me, but I was safe behind the bar.
I get really nervous in crowds, and I don't do

(37:54):
well in a lot, you know, I didn't do well
in a lot of crowded social situation, and so the
bar was a really great way for me to you know,
feel safe and comfortable, and that worked super super well.
Once I stopped bartending, my social life was my work

(38:15):
and I was working seven days a week and we'd
work really long hours and we had a great time.
So my social life involved the people that worked with me,
and that was it. That was It seemed fine at
the time. I you know, I didn't date very much
at all and just worked.

Speaker 2 (38:41):
At what point did you meet your husband Rick?

Speaker 1 (38:44):
I met Rick when I was thirty. I had just
turned thirty, and that was that was a big turning point.
How did you meet He wanted a mural for his
loft and he was working at Bank of America.

Speaker 2 (39:00):
Oh, at least that was his excuse, was it.

Speaker 1 (39:03):
Well, he didn't know me. He actually so he was
working at Bank of America downtown and there was a
restaurant like in the main floor of the building. I
think it was called like Cafe Bachi or something like that.
And actually it was a friend of mine, this guy,
Robin Brisker, who did all the painting there. And you know,
Rick really liked it and he asked, you know, could

(39:24):
he get the number of the artists that did the work,
And he ended up getting Robin's number, and Robin reached
out to me and he was like, you know, I
just don't have time to deal with this, and I
don't want to do anything residential. Can you call this guy?
And I was like, well, I'm really busy, but yeah,
I can get to it in a few weeks. And
so like three weeks later I called Rick and we

(39:47):
scheduled a time for me to come to his loft
and that was in River North in Chicago, and it
was like, I think we scheduled it for like eight
in the morning, and so he was, you know, kind
of halfway out the door, getting ready to go to work,
but he just wanted to show me what he wanted

(40:07):
done and you know, get a price and maybe schedule
it out. So I went there that morning and it
was pretty it was pretty instantaneous that we were like
we just looked at each other like hmm. And so
I scheduled the work and I got it done. And
then that was that he was so shy and kind

(40:30):
of like awkward. And so a couple of weeks afterwards,
I was at the gym and I was running on
the treadmill and one of the trainers at the gym
came up to me and he's like, excuse me, I'm
really I'm really sorry to bother you, but there's a
guy back there that wants me to tell you that
you're running wrong. And I was so feisty and I

(40:53):
was like, what the didn't what? And I look back
and it's Rick and he's got this goofy grin on
his face, and I'm like, what the heck? So I
went back there and I'm like, what do you mean
I run wrong? He's like, I'm sorry. I just wanted
to get your attention so I could tell you that
you missed a spot. And it's like I just like

(41:14):
to say. I'm like okay. So we scheduled a time
like a few days later, and I scheduled it for
like after work, so you know, like I knew if
I didn't miss the spot. I was like this, he
has no idea how to ask me out, So I
just I wore my favorite jeans that night. I went

(41:36):
over there and I was like totally just I don't know,
I don't know what I expected. But sure enough I
got there and he was so shy and awkward. He's like, okay,
so here's the spot and there was no spot and
if you can just do that, I'm going to go
to the gym and I'll just I'll see you later
and I was like, I just looked at him, like,

(41:59):
do you have any wants? He's like, and he kind
of stopped in his tracks and he's like, yeah, I
have really good wine, and so he's dressed for the gym,
but he got a bottle of wine out and we
proceeded to sit there and just talk for like three
hours before he ever like kind of even reached over

(42:21):
and touched my hand. And the moment he touched my hand,
it was like a power surge went through both of us.
And it was crazy because he just kind of looked
at me and he's like, we're going to get married.

Speaker 2 (42:38):
Did he really say that?

Speaker 1 (42:39):
Oh? Yeah, it was like we just knew. It was
so so crazy, and so I was like, well, the
hot water's not on at my place, so maybe I'll
just hang out. And I never left and we got
married two years later.

Speaker 2 (42:54):
Man, it's a fabulous love story.

Speaker 1 (42:58):
Oh he's the love of my life.

Speaker 2 (43:00):
He is just that's wonderful.

Speaker 1 (43:02):
He's the greatest guy on earth.

Speaker 2 (43:04):
Because that would be a great pickup line, I would
like you to paint a mural in my bedroom.

Speaker 1 (43:12):
Yeah, yeah, you could say that to anyone. It might
really suck, but anyway, did you ever finish the mural? Oh? Yeah, yeah.
And then when we moved so, you know, after we
had our first son, we moved to the suburbs, and
we actually had the mural taken off the wall and

(43:35):
we brought it with and we put it on the
dining room wall of our house in Lake Forest.

Speaker 2 (43:43):
That's fabulous. So tell me how the art was playing
out during those early days. Then after you met.

Speaker 1 (43:51):
Rick, well, so early on, you know, not long after
I move then and all of that. Rick ended up
leaving Bank of America and took a job with Merrill
Lynch in New York. And it was so ironic because like,
as an artist, I was like, oh, I always wanted

(44:11):
my art to be in New York. And I don't know,
I was still doing the murals and that sort of thing,
but yeah, I was kind of slowing down with that anyway.
So when he took the job, that was when he
officially asked me to marry him. And you know, I
think he probably thought I wasn't going to give up

(44:32):
my long running business and livelihood and all those things
without being you know, properly engaged or whatever. I think
I would have followed him anywhere but anyway, we got
engaged and I gave my business to my two employees
at the time, and so they took over and I

(44:55):
went to New York and I I just plummeted. I
just did not know what to do at all. I
might I you know, it was kind of like then
I was hit full on in the face with your
art stuck, and you have no talent, and you're not

(45:17):
going to make it here. You don't know anybody, you
don't have the connection, you know. On and on, I
beat myself up so badly. I ended up in a
really really deep, profound depression, and I just it was
just the greatest irony because I really wanted to be
an artist in New York, you know, and I just

(45:43):
I wasn't. I just wasn't. I couldn't figure out what
to do. And yeah, so Rick saw that I was
really just not doing well, and then he got bent
on a project like I think it was like South
Korea somewhere, and he was gone for like three weeks,
and I just sat there just felling, falling apart, and

(46:03):
I'm like, that's it. I have to go back to Chicago.
So I left. I went back to Chicago and you know,
just worked on a couple projects, you know, with my
old employees, and yeah, kind of picked up where I
left off a little bit. But even that felt awkward
because I was really not the boss, you know, and

(46:26):
so that was weird. And anyway, so then Rick left
Meryl Lynch, which was like nobody leaves Merrill Lynch. But
he came back. He came back to Chicago, and we
got married, you know, February of two thousand and one.
And I can't remember the exact timeline of everything, but

(46:50):
we came back and that same year was nine to eleven.
So I've always said he should thank me because we
weren't there in the midst of that. But it was
still very traumatic. We obviously knew people that didn't make

(47:11):
it from that whole thing. I was also seven months
pregnant by that time, so I was like just a
bag of emotions. It was. It was a very very
traumatic experience at that time. And anyway, so while we

(47:33):
were back in Chicago and while I was pregnant, I
was working on my paintings, but still kind of feeling
like nothing was good enough. And then our son was born,
and I was very, very excited and just into being
a mom and still working on paintings, but you know,
just not really connecting with the work so much. And

(47:56):
then we decided to move to the suburbs for schools,
because schools in the city were just not going to
work well for us, so we moved to the suburbs.
And I was working on paintings and kind of working
in the garage and that sort of thing. And I
just had a total meltdown one day working on a

(48:18):
painting and just not connecting with it and not feeling
like it was good enough, and I needed to, you know,
go inside the house and take care of Ian or whatever.
And I just had a bad day in the studio
and in the garage as it was. But I took
all the paint off my palette and just scraped it

(48:40):
all over the painting, and yeah, just an anger. It
was pure anger. And when I went back to that
painting the following day, I sort of saw a face
in it, you know, And the human brains are we're
wired to see faces, you know, anywhere clouds, leaves, the sidewalk, whatever, know,
so no surprise that I could see that. But anyway,

(49:03):
I was kind of intrigued and I felt a connection
to it in some strange way, and so I just
mixed up some more paint and kept the palette knife
in my hand because that's what I used to scrape
all the paint on there in the first place, and
so I sort of started, I started, you know, drawing
the face out, and it became this sort of primal mask.

(49:27):
But as I was painting it, I was absolutely connecting
to you know, I'll just say it was a bad
experience from my past. I was connecting to it, and
it was really wild because I was sort of unraveling
the story in I don't know, it was an interesting,

(49:49):
an interesting way of unraveling the story. It wasn't you know,
so provocative, like I needed to splash the canvas or
throw blood at it or anything. But it was a
big story and it was all coming through in this face.
And after a few hours I just kind of stood

(50:11):
back from that canvas and I still had the palette
knife in my hand, and it was sort of like,
this is going to age me. But it made me
think of the Funds in Happy Days when he goes
to comb his hair and he doesn't because he's already
realizing he's perfect. I had the palette knife in my hand,

(50:32):
and I really felt like, you know, I had never
felt like I finished a painting before that, and I
had the palette knife ready to you know, keep going
and do what needed to be done, and I was like,
nothing needs to be done. And I pretty much just

(50:56):
collapsed right there and then and just bawled my eyes out,
and I was like, it's done, and it's good, and
I knew it was good, and I felt it felt
like there was a string connecting my absolute heart to

(51:17):
that canvas, and I it was just incredible. And what
was even I think the most incredible element of it
was as dark as that story was that I was
tapping into and as cathartic as that experience was of
sort of unraveling it, sort of telling that story through

(51:40):
the pain that painting, you know, even though it was
kind of primal and all of that, it was a good,
happy painting because I felt so good having gotten it out,
and so I felt like it was a very positive,
you know, beautiful painting, and so anyway, I felt super

(52:03):
super great and super happy and super positive. And I
proceeded for the next year to do thirty nine more
paintings and so you know, like I said, I had been,
you know, as a young teenager, I used to hang
out in all the art galleries downtown and so they
all knew me. And I'd shown them my paintings along
the way and you know, they're like, you're a sweet kid,

(52:24):
you know, keep at it, you'll get there, you know,
that sort of thing. And anyway, I called one of
my favorite art dealers back then was a guy named
Roy Boyd, and he had a gallery in River North
on Wells and he was always so kind to me,
you know, but also very honest and you know, blunt.

(52:46):
And anyway, he was my first call because I always
wanted to be in an art gallery, you know. And
I called Roy and I'm like, I think I'm onto something.
You know. He had always told me, you know, do
twenty paintings and then talk to me, you know, just
like twenty paintings. I didn't do twenty paintings. Well, I
did forty. So I was ready and I showed them
to Roy and he's like, you are onto something. They

(53:10):
are good like, but I can't show them. There's like
all you know, in my mind, I stopped at you
are good and you know, so I didn't mind the no,
you know, it hurt. But I was like and I
was like why, and he said, they're too dark. They're
you know, they I can't show these to my clients.

(53:31):
And I'm like dark, like, but they're not. They're actually not.
They're very happy, very positive. They're you know this, this
catharsis for me. They're healing. They're beautiful. And he's like,
I hear you, and I respect that, but this is
not for my gallery. And so from there, I just

(53:52):
I didn't stop, you know, trying. I kept putting them
out there, and fairly soon not you know, it didn't
even take that long. There was a gallery in Chicago
called Arc and it was actually a co op gallery,
but I didn't care. If I was going to get
a break, I was getting a break, and so I
did a show at that gallery and it sold out.

(54:17):
So from there, I just it just kept going. I
just kept, you know, doing what I did. And I
think I was still that show might have still been up,
but you know, it had sold out. I had some
other paintings left at the studio, and Rick's parents used

(54:39):
to go to Palm Beach for the winters, and I
think while that show was up. We went down to
Palm Beach over Christmas and we went into a gallery
on Worth Avenue and had the boys with us, and
we were just looking at the art and the boys
were banging on paintings, know, doing what they do, and

(55:02):
the art dealer there was really nice and she actually
encouraged them to touch the paintings, and I was like, wow,
that's different, and I liked that. And so I was
just looking at a painting and Rick started talking to
her about how I'm an artist and that she should
look at my website. And I was so embarrassed, like, oh,
I don't know how that's going to go. But and

(55:22):
she just looked like, you know, okay, if they're going
to buy something, I'll do it. So she just kind
of pulled it up on her computer sort of passively.
You know, I could see her face and then I
saw her face change, and she like was sort of
kind of glued to the screen, and she just kind

(55:42):
of looked up at us and she goes, where do
you guys live? And Rick said, we live in Lake Forest, Chicago,
and she said, I'm going to book a flight. She
booked a flight while we were still there in the gallery,
and she flew up to Chicago, came to the studio,
she selected I want to say it was eighteen pieces,

(56:04):
and she had them all created and sent down there,
and that was the first true gallery to represent me.
And so that was kind of mind blowing. And then
soon after that, I can't remember the exact order of things,
but then I built a studio behind our house, so

(56:26):
I was working back there, and somehow the art buyer
for Neiman Marcus Group got my information. They flew someone
up from Dallas and they came checked out the studio
and they commissioned two pieces for their Michigan Avenue store
and they were big. They were each sixty by sixty inches.

(56:49):
So I did those pieces. So I was probably on
the very tail end of something with Neman Marcus. Neman
Marcus Group historically was known for their art collection. They
actually published many books for their art collection, so this
was sort of a big deal. Unfortunately, you know, this

(57:10):
is right when shopping trends were changing and people were
shopping more online and all of that. So I don't
I don't think I've ever made it into any published books.
The paintings are still there in their Michigan Avenue store,
but I think, you know, you know, so many retailers
are just going away. You know, Macy's gone, Marshall Field

(57:32):
has gone, Barney's has gone, you know, all these they're
all going away. So the good news was it was
a really great commission, and you know, it's a prominent
location and they were at one time very well known
for it, so that was kind of a neat thing.
And then let's see, so the gallery in Palm Beach,

(57:56):
it turns out they were sharing my art with another
gallery and I found that out in kind of a
weird way. Somebody was interested in a piece and I
called the gallery to check on it, and she's like, well,
it's not here. And I was like, what do you
mean it's not here? Who it's old? And she's like no,
Like well where is it? She told me. And I'm like, well,
that seems very strange to me, like why would that

(58:19):
be happening? And so her practices ended up being a
little uncomfortable for me, and so I ended up pulling
out of her gallery. But I called the gallery that
she was sharing my work with, and you know, she
was like, I am so glad you called me, because
we've been selling the heck out of your work, and
you know, we'd love to take you on. And so
that's a gallery that I'm still with now. And she's

(58:41):
got four locations in Southeast Florida and she's just a
huge operation down there. So it's just been, you know,
one after another. I probably now get contacted by I
don't know, it sounds boastful, but I get contacted by
galleries who want to present me. So it's pretty cool.

Speaker 2 (59:02):
That is very cool. What a success story. And I'm
wondering at what point you set on your style, Renee,
because you were doing those paintings when you had that
light bulb moment, you developed a style that was working there.
But now, how did that, the change in your style

(59:23):
and your preference now bring you to where you are today.

Speaker 1 (59:27):
Well, that's actually a really good question. It's sort of
evolved from those paintings that I thought were so personal.
They were so deeply, deeply personal and so autobiographical. You know,
they were tapping into these stories that I needed to
work through. And mind you, I've had a ton of

(59:50):
therapy over the years. I've been treated extensively for PTSD,
and you know, I've you know, I've been through a lot,
so I know what therapy is like. But I would
tell you I got so much more out of working
on these pieces. It was just no holds barred, just
laying it out there and working through it. And it

(01:00:12):
was this incredible mental exercise. And as I got through
those forty pieces, they were changing, you know. And by
the end, you know, like when you've had a lot
of psychotherapy, you know, a lot of times along the
way they're like, you know, let's do a group session,
and I was like, absolutely not. Nobody knows what I'm

(01:00:33):
going through. Nobody can relate to what I've been through.
I want no part of empathizing with somebody else's stupid
story or you know whatever. I was. I had such
intensity around that idea. I could not do it. I
just couldn't. And what was really interesting as I was

(01:00:54):
working through these was I was unraveling all these stories.
I was unraveling myself, and I found that I was
able to start hearing other people's stories. I was able
to empathize and take on other people's pain and energy,

(01:01:15):
and I just, I don't know, it started transforming the work.
And so by the time I was done with those pieces,
they weren't just these these masts. They were becoming these
full figures, more confident beings and sort of portraying myself

(01:01:39):
at their core, but becoming a little bit of everyone.
And it was Yeah, So it just sort of came
from there.

Speaker 2 (01:01:48):
And now do you feel you have a clear passway
of where your art is and where it might be
going or do you still feel that you're evolving in
it might change direction at any time, depending on where
you're at personally.

Speaker 1 (01:02:03):
Well, I would say any artist would tell you that, Yeah,
the work could evolve at any time. I think the
work does evolve. It constantly evolves and changes as I go.
You know, I don't feel any desire to push it
in any direction. I don't feel the need to, you know,

(01:02:25):
change what I do in any way. I don't. You know.
Somebody asked me once, you know, like, are you always
going to paint these girls? You know? Yeah, what's wrong
with painting these girls? I like these girls. These girls
tell stories, They they balance me. They you know, I
love them. They're my army of champions. And this is

(01:02:46):
what I do. This is what I'm known for, and
I connect with it. So I think if at any
point in the course of you know, my lifetime. If
that changes, you know, I'm still an artist. I'm going
to do what I'm thriven to do. But you know,

(01:03:07):
there was another thing back in the eighties. You know,
I used to always ask people, you know, how did
you get your art into you know, where's Larry Gegosi it?
I need to show him something, you know or whatever.
I was really trying to figure out the you know,
what's the way in right And I who was an

(01:03:29):
artist back then, and I asked him the same question,
and he's like, Rene, be careful what you wish for,
because if you have any success in this field, you're
going to get pigeonholed into doing the same shit over
and over again. And I just looked at him. I'm like, God,
you're such an asshole. I'm like, I should be so lucky.
And you know, so there's an element of that now.

(01:03:51):
I sort of get it. I didn't get it back then.
You know, if I were to deviate from painting these
girls and I started painting both or in dogs or something,
you know, yeah, people would probably you know, scratch their
heads and be like, what what are you doing? I mean,
it'd be like you know, if Picasso started painting flowers,

(01:04:15):
if Rothko started painting figures. I mean, you know, some
people might judge and say, oh, it's the same old
shit over and over again. But why Rothcoe is known
for doing the same old shit over and over again
those Picasso. So you know you can do this with Mandria.

(01:04:38):
You can go and say this about any great artist
in history, any of them. They do the same thing
because that is what they do. So why judge? Right? So,
you know, the work evolves. We're artists, you know, we're
feeling experiencing human beings, and so yeah, that's going to

(01:04:58):
impact the work, and it's going to change over time.
I think unless I have some sort of you know,
mental break of some sort, I don't think it's going
to be anything dramatic from one day to the next.
I think it just evolves.

Speaker 2 (01:05:15):
Where does the satisfaction come in? Is it when you
finish a piece or is it when it's viewed by
the public and you get further validation. Where's the ultimate satisfaction?

Speaker 1 (01:05:27):
Oh? I think I just get it from the process,
I really do. I think, you know, for me being
in the studio working with the materials, you know, just
the doing is where I get the greatest gratification. The
bonus is that I can put these pieces out to

(01:05:50):
the world and ultimately that you know, people want them
and the work self, you know. But if that didn't happen,
I don't I mean, I'd probably just be stacking them
up outside and giving them away, you know. That's that's
a big part of, by the way, why I have
art galleries because you know, somebody tells me that they

(01:06:13):
like them, like beer, take it please, it's yours. If
you like it, you should. You should own this. And
that's what I did for a while there. And I'm
not good with dealing with money. I don't care about
money in that way. I would rather you know, I

(01:06:34):
really feel like art is a thing that needs to
be accessible. If somebody connects with a piece of art,
they should have that piece of art. I'm a big
believer in that. It's it's you know, dealing with the
financial aspects of what I do is something that I

(01:06:56):
really struggle with. So the art galleries are there to
protect me and protect the values of the work and
that sort of thing, and that's something that I don't
really care to deal with at all. So it's really
good that I have them. But at the same time,
you know, I wish I could give it away. I

(01:07:17):
wish I could afford to I wish I, you know,
was just you know, so wealthy that I didn't care
you know, making at least a little money to you know,
buy things that I want or live the lifestyle that
I want to have, or that sort of thing. But yeah,

(01:07:38):
I really really think that when somebody has a visceral
connection to a piece of art, that they need to
find a way to have that piece of art. It's
that powerful.

Speaker 2 (01:07:51):
Does it therefore have to be commercial for you than
your art today?

Speaker 1 (01:07:57):
Oh gosh, yeah, yeah, no questions. I live and breathe
what I do. It's been a part of my life
since what since I was sick. I've always known that
this is what I want to do. I wrote my
parents a letter from Ecuador. The letter said, when I
grow up, I want to have my art in an
art gallery and museums. I said that, and that I

(01:08:20):
want to drive a Rolls Royce because it has my
initials all over it. That was very clear. I knew
what I wanted to do. Yeah, so this is this
has been my path all along, and you know, it's
been a struggle, been an immense struggle, but it's just

(01:08:41):
I just keep going. I just keep doing.

Speaker 2 (01:08:43):
How much of your work is commission.

Speaker 1 (01:08:47):
I have probably a fair amount. I'm always you know,
there isn't really a single month that goes by that
I don't have at least one commission so in the mix.
So right now I've got three commissions that I need
to be working on. Uh, I'll probably get too done
within the next few weeks, and then I have a

(01:09:09):
really big one that's going to New York City that
I'll get done probably next month.

Speaker 2 (01:09:17):
What's your parents' reaction, your sibly's reaction to this?

Speaker 1 (01:09:20):
Now?

Speaker 2 (01:09:20):
What does does Gina ever buy your art? Your your parents?
I mean, how does your mother feel? Because I'm sure
she wasn't that supportive and she must be quite surprised
that the artist you've turned out to be.

Speaker 1 (01:09:32):
Well, I'll say this, you know, as tough as my
childhood might have been, I was always referred to as
Renee the artists, So you know, in whatever way they
knew how you know, they were supportive of that. That's
just who I am. I would never sell a piece
of art to my family. They Gina had. Gina has

(01:09:54):
thirty pieces in her house, so she's got so much
of my work. And my mom has a pieces as well.
I actually painted a mural in my mom's kitchen. It
was a copy of a Menet painting and that takes
up the whole wall in her kitchen. I did that,

(01:10:14):
I don't know, years ago, probably twenty years ago, something
like that. Yeah, so they you know, I would never
sell to my family, but there's the They love what
I do and I think they're proud of me, and
you know, that feels nice. I guess who's.

Speaker 2 (01:10:34):
The first person you show your work to? Is it
your husband?

Speaker 1 (01:10:36):
Rick? See? No, you know, I show some pieces to Rick.
Rick is really great, you know, like he knows right
away what pieces are going to really do well. He's
got a good eye. So I like when I you know,
when I feel a particular connection to a specific piece,
I'll come home, you know, I'll take a picture with

(01:10:58):
my phone and be like, what do you think of that?
And He'll be like, you know, yeah, that's you did it.
And so he always knows and I think I do too,
and that's why I show those to him before anyone else.
But I show with enough galleries now that you know,
I'm often showing them the work before anything else because

(01:11:19):
they're waiting for pieces.

Speaker 2 (01:11:22):
So what are you looking forward to in twenty twenty five.

Speaker 1 (01:11:26):
Well, I started, you know, with the idea that I
was going to slow things down for this year, and
you know, just you know, I had two shows on
the calendar, and I was going to just kind of
you know, slow my process and you know, not push

(01:11:47):
so hard. I'm extremely prolific when I'm in the studio
and I'm on, I am super on, and I I
paint like mad and i work on my sculptures and
I've just you know, I'm it sounds like I'm a
production hound, but I just love painting so much, and
I can just I'm a hustler at my heart, you know,

(01:12:09):
So I just work. I love doing what I do.
But I also recognize that I needed to slow myself down,
and so I'm trying to find ways of doing that.
And so I've been trying to focus more on keeping
balance in my life. So I hike a few mornings
a week, I work out a couple mornings a week.

(01:12:31):
I actually recently enrolled at Middlebury Institute, which is a
really interesting place right here in Monterey. They actually train
the military on foreign language studies, and I wanted to,
you know, get my Spanish back to where it needs

(01:12:53):
to be. You know, I am conversational now, but I'm
not fluent, and I would like to be perfectly, seamlessly fluent,
and so I enrolled in a semester long course for that.
So I'm trying to balance out my studio time. But

(01:13:14):
sure as anything is. You know, it seems to happen
every single year that I go into saying I'm going
to go easy this year. You know, I work with
a lot of galleries, and you know they're all like, hey,
can you do a show in July? Yes, I say
yes to everything. I just it's always been my nature.
So I try to figure everything out and I figure

(01:13:38):
out the balancing elements along the way. So yeah, I've
got a lot more than just the two shows. I
have a lot of travel this year, and so you know,
my task is just to find the balance.

Speaker 2 (01:13:55):
Well, clearly there has been a bumpy road in your past, Renee,
but it sounds as if you're in a good place now.
Are you happy?

Speaker 1 (01:14:04):
Oh gosh, yeah, I mean I'm living the dream. I'm
living the dream of making a really good living as
an artist, and I can. I could say that for
thirty years now, I've been making a really good living
just as an artist, and not a lot of us

(01:14:25):
can say that. So that's a huge dream, I'm true.
And you know, just looking at my life, I'm so
happily married to the most wonderful person on earth, and
I have two sons who are strong and healthy and

(01:14:48):
happy and intelligent, and who don't think I'm crazy or
flawed or anything. You know, I don't know too many
kids that can grow up not thinking their parents are nutjobs.
And my kids just love me and they love us,
and they're just great. And then just look at where

(01:15:09):
I live, you know, I live on the beach in Carmel, California,
and I am just it's a dream life, it really is.
And yeah, I just have to pinch myself.

Speaker 2 (01:15:26):
What a wonderful success story and a happy point that
you're in now. It really is wonderful. I thoroughly enjoyed
hearing your story, and I truly appreciate you being so
candid and sharing such intimate times of your life. And
I really appreciate you taking the time to come on
the show, Renee, thank you for having me, and remember

(01:15:48):
to scroll down the show notes, where you'll find a
link to Cinciana's website and hast social media. There's also
a link to our Instagram and YouTube channel, and whilst
you're on YouTube, don't forget to check out the videos
we have there. We have bonus content of all our
guests now on YouTube. At the Art podcast Don't Forget
That's Art with two A's, you'll find not only all

(01:16:10):
of the podcast as over ninety episodes of the three
seasons that we've done already, and there's also video content
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so you get a bit of bonus content and you
get to see the artist. And whilst you're on your
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(01:16:31):
with anyone you think might enjoy the show too. My
thanks again to my guests this week, Rene Romero Schuler,
and to you for listening. I'll be back in two
weeks time when my guests will be another creative woman
from around the world of visual arts, so I do
hope you'll join me then