Debra Valentine Matthews  was born and raised in a rural suburb of Minneapolis, Minnesota. While growing up, her family kept a number of pets including rabbits, dogs, cats, ducks and even turkeys. These were Debra’s first subjects and she has many fond memories of hours spent drawing animals, her favorite being horses. During high school Debra took all the drawing and painting classes that were offered and excelled beyond her own expectations. It was at this point she knew that a career in art would be her ultimate goal.

In the early eighties Debra took many diverse art classes in subjects ranging from art history to computer graphics. After moving to Phoenix in 1982 she acquired a position with a graphic arts firm as a typographer but soon moved into the computer graphics department. In the years to follow Debra worked in the technically exacting area of pre-press and computer aided masking. Although employed in the graphic arts field, Debra often felt limited at her work and longed for a career where she could be in complete control of the artistic process from beginning to end. She wanted to chose the subject, setting, color, composition and end result of each project.

During the nineties Debra went through an “exploratory” period. She worked in various media as photography, fabric, wood, acrylic and of course, computer art. In 1999 Debra came back to oil painting which she had experimented in previously but had been frustrated by the “slippery” quality of the medium. By reading numerous books and taking classes at Scottsdale Artist’s School, Debra gained the skills she needed to create beautiful works of art. She initially painted landscape, then moved on to portraiture at her husband’s urging to give it a try. Debra soon found that painting portraits gave her more satisfaction than any other art she had previously created. She now embarks on each portrait painting adventure with great enthusiasm. Each face holds new challenges and opportunity for artistic expansion. It is her goal to paint each portrait to the complete extent of her ability, creating a treasured family heirloom which will be held dear to her clients for many years to come.

Debra works at her home studio in West Bloomfield, Michigan where she lives with her husband, Tom, and two daughters. When not at her easel, Debra enjoys mountain biking, volunteering at the elementary school, and playing violin.