Sister Isabel Guerra is a nun at the Cistercian monastery of Santa Lucia, Zaragoza in Spain. She is a self-taught painter whose work in oil is often strikingly realistic, at times leaning to classical styles, at other times with more modern elements.

Though she also paints landscapes and still lifes, her primary subjects are portraits of women and girls, usually in naturalistic environments or interiors that incorporate still life subjects, and often bathed in shafts of light.

Though she rejected formal instruction, you can see the influence of painters she has studied, Velásquez, Rembrandt, Vermeer and even Bouguereau. She apparently spent a good deal of time studying paintings at the Prado in Madrid.

She is now an honorary member of the Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Luis and the Real Academia de Bellas Artes y Ciencias Históricas de Toledo.

There is very little biographical information available, The isabelguerra.com website is not official but does have a selection of her works, even if they are not always of good quality. There is a brief interview on El Mundo magazine (ES, Google Translate English here).

[Suggestion courtesy of Aelle Ayres]

I came across an mention of his name the other day that made me want to revisit the work of California plein air painter Brian Blood.

There are now literally hundreds of his subtle but richly colored paintings on his website. Don’t miss the fascinating series in which he paints the interiors of California Missions. Click through to larger versions, though they are still on the small side.

You can see larger images of his work on the site of the Jones & Terwilliger Galleries, and a few larger still on Hollis Fine Art.

For more information, see my previous post on Brian Blood.