I am a California born self-taught artist who after living in Seattle, Chicago, New York City, and Philadelphia, immigrated to Porto, Portugal in 2024. Looking back, it was clear in my early childhood that I was destined to be a maker. What wasn’t clear as how that path was going to manifest itself in my life.

My early adult years were about aimlessly wandering around the forest of life without any sense of direction. This was followed by a period of self discovery and getting my sh*t together. By the time I was in my mid 40s, I had built a nice life for myself. I had a great career, owned my apartment in Manhattan, and then met and married my amazing husband. All the while I had put my creative self on the back burner for the better part several decades.

My journey to where I am at today has been unequivocally uneven. Over the years, I’ve acquired a wide variety of skills and talents. Some through sheer need, others as a direct result of my endless curiosity. Recent years have enabled me to explore various mediums of creating art. I have done woodcut print making, digital generative art making, various painting techniques (acrylics, cold wax, and oils), and working with hot wax creating encaustics.

I spent much of 2025 focusing on Generative Art, by applying my logical self with code, generating stunningly detailed and in my opinion beautiful digital line art, which I then translate into the physical world with pen, paper, and the assist of my drawing robot. In the spring of 2026, I set out to challenge myself by making over 150 mini abstract paintings tapping into the art of play all the while learning and practicing new techniques.

But my real love lies in encaustics. There is something about working with hot beeswax, tinted with pigments and melted onto wood panels, generating layers of intrigue and interest, that feeds my creative soul more deeply than any other medium I have worked with. The “Whoosh” of my butane torch firing up as I fuse layer after layer of wax together is always a thrill, as is the idea that I can embed hidden messages and secrets within the work. I have even developed my own method of encoding words and messages which mimic the look of algebraic equations.

There remains a million ideas floating about my head. I am now tasked with filtering them down to a realistic quantifiable body of work. This is where I am at now. I will be spending much of 2026 and 2027 working on my first serious series to establish my mark on the world.

It is never too late to make a start, it could be argued that starting is what we do every day, all the time, at every moment.

Each moment we can make a change, begin anew or continue unthinkingly with the old. I choose new beginnings as I move through my life, I savor what I have experienced and move on to fresh experiences . . . few rules apply. Join me as I explore this next stage of my creative life.
— Devyn Caldwell