Julia Crozier

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Coming from a family with artistic roots, the concept of being an artist was never anything but normal to Julia Crozier. When she was young, her father taught her to paint watercolors from life. As an outdoor enthusiast, Julia developed a love of painting landscapes.

After attending the St. Paul School of Associated Arts, Julia married, started a family, and started painting in earnest. With its flexible schedule and the option of working at home, art was a career path that meshed well with raising children. Julia’s art show sales were supplemented by a series of murals and book illustrations. She co-founded the Big River Gallery and Studio with fellow artist Sue Becker in Bellevue, IA in the 1990’s and continued there until moving to Winona in 1996.

Since returning to the Winona area, Julia has continued to paint and explore new media. From her roots as a watercolorist, Julia has worked extensively with oil pastels, and more recently delved into oil paints and mixed media including mixes of oil, oil pastel, and wax media.

Her main subject matter through the years has been landscapes, especially those landscapes in which the grandeur of creation can be found in the sheer openness of the land. The Dakota prairies and the Scottish Highlands are perennial favorites. As a home-based artist it is only natural that scenes, objects around the home, and commonplace domestic chores should round out the bulk of her erstwhile subjects. More recently, Julia’s experimentation with various media and larger formats has allowed Julia to stretch out as an artist both in size and expression, leading to the creation of several large abstract paintings. She followed this line of work after opening the Blue Heron Gallery and Studio in Winona, MN. The studio gave her to work in large formats and to create several works synchronously. It also provided the opportunity for displaying her work as well as the work of other artists in the adjacent gallery.