Every adult, no matter that person’s occupation, needs a creative outlet. So says watercolor artist Betty Drozeski, along with millions of others.

"It doesn’t have to be painting," said Drosezki. "Just find the thing that is so absorbing that when you’re doing it the world slips away and you even forget to have lunch." Drozeski follows this routine frequently.

Drozeski grew up in St. Louis, Missouri. Her father, a chef, had a special talent above all others among his skills in food preparation: he became known for his ice sculptures. "I have an old newspaper article about him that talks about his artistry ‘melting away.’ At least he didn’t have the problem of storing or destroying old work," Drozeski said. His artistic influence did not melt away; his daughter took every art class she could in high school, and under an excellent instructor who introduced her to various media, techniques, and theories. "Those are the only classes I remember," she said.

In college she majored in biology, and earned many credits in chemistry. "Back then, biology involved a lot of observation then drawing what you saw. And the only thing I remember about chemistry were the colors you could make."

In adulthood, she used her science education to work in strontium 90 research — finding the best farming practices to ensure that none of that radioactive material finds its way into food — and later, in bacteriology labs. "Again," she said, "observation and colors."

Decades after that job, and following marriage and children, Drozeski’s husband’s work took the family to Columbia, S.C., just 2½ hours from the barrier islands. The family became so attached to the coastal area that they bought a condo at their favorite of the islands, Kiawah. There, Drozeski said, "Sunrises and sunsets are spectacular."

Viewing her work — especially her watercolors of the marshlands, the low dunes, and the show-stopping skies that accompany them — makes the artist’s affection for the islands easy to understand. The yellow greens of the dune grasses along with the delicate blues and blue-greens of the tidewater moving among them have become a signature Drozeski combination. But years were to pass before she brought all of it into focus as her own painting path.

After an extended residence in South Carolina and frequent visits to the coast, Drozeski and her husband moved to Richmond. With that move, she "got serious" about painting and took art classes in various media to decide which she liked best. Settling on watercolor, she first turned out many still life paintings, most with hard edges and intense color. "About the same time," she said, as she recalled the frequent visits to Kiawah, "I was photographing the big skies and the marsh expanses of Kiawah. I don’t why I took so long to try to paint them."

On trips to South Carolina, she visited galleries in Charleston and gravitated toward the paintings by area artists who painted those same skies and marshes that she had loved for years. "Now," she said, "the place is so much a part of me that the colors mix themselves."

When Drozeski’s children were grown, she took time for the classes she knew she needed and wanted. A further level of serious concentration set in, and now painting occupies the majority of her time and interest.

The artist’s brilliant greens and yellow greens — the colors of the wet marsh grasses — give way as they recede to softer, almost neutral olives and grays. In "Afterglow," for example, from sky, down to hills, to water, to dune growth, the colors relate closely. Likewise, the delicate pinks and beiges in "Through the Trees" work gently forward from sky to foreground.

Trees, loose and airy against skies that echo subtly the other areas in the paintings, invite the viewer to experience vicariously the tidal breezes. Drozeski’s paintings speak as clearly as words do of the love of the artist for the salt marshes and the changing, glowing skies that illuminate them.

However, the artist has not limited her subjects to these favorite places or to one style. One body of her later work demonstrates that still life paintings of fruits and vegetables can be as creative as depictions of the great outdoors. Drozeski’s richly colored fruits surprise the viewer with their intensity and with their startling but convincing highlights of white paper. In still another vein, the artist returns to the coastal motifs and deliberately stylizes palms, dune vegetation, and pool shapes. She brings out abstract qualities in "Orchids Three" — a tall vase and a deliberately exaggerated arc serving as the productive stem of the vertical row of blooms, all against a dark background.

The Drozeskis’ goal is to spend 100 days a year at Kiawah, but they seldom can find time for more than 70 or 80. The artist plays golf when she goes to the island, and observes from the course the atmosphere, colors, and forms in the coastal environment. "Golf courses have great expanses," she said. It is easy to believe that this artist will continue to respond, often and eagerly, to the call of the coast.

Uptown Gallery in Richmond and Michael Cyra’s Gallery at Kiawah Island both exhibit and sell Drozeski’s paintings. FP