Stacy Kamin studied illustration and traditional animation at the Academy of Art University in San Francisco, earning a BA in 2000. I knew early on that I had to be an artist.” She joined her family in Los Angeles and there found a well-respected Chinese artist, Shuqiao Zhou, to mentor her privately for six years. Zhou’s teachers came from the great Russian lineage of Ilya Repin and Valentin Serov, and through this expressive tradition, imparted a love of paint that is still a hallmark of Stacy’s work. Drawn to the dramatic effects of Rembrandt, Stacy sought out the instruction of two well-known masters of this knowledge—David A Leffel and Sherrie McGraw. She credits their influence for the startling light that she is able to achieve in her own work. “They introduced me to Abstract Realism, a way of painting so rich that I can’t imagine my education ever ending—I will be a student of this great tradition for my entire life.”