ABOUT THE ARTIST

Charnée de Souza is an illustrator and designer based in Santa Clarita, California. She was born in 1999 in Harare, Zimbabwe along with many of her family members, but was raised in California which is where she had resided as since 2002. Growing up, Charnee was always grateful for the life her parents had provided for their family, so naturally she gravitated toward the medical field as a way to give back. However, after studying for nursing at Grand Canyon University in Phoenix, Arizona for two years, and a lifelong love for creating artwork, she decided to change her path and pursue art with the constant encouragement of her parents. She had already been doing commissions here and there for friends and family and a couple people that found her art through Instagram, but those, and her mid study session sketches, were all she really had when applying to schools. At the time, she worked primarily in graphite pencil or acrylic paints and had no clear idea of what she wanted to do with her art or where she fit in in the art world. Now, as a student at ArtCenter College of Design in Pasadena, she finds interest in many different mediums, but mostly produces oil paintings of portraits. Her subject matter mostly consists of portraits inspired by her loved ones, and she often uses herself as a reference as well, due to the convenience. She tends to follow a predominately complimentary color palette, usually of blues and oranges. She will be graduating from ArtCenter at the end of Summer 2022 with a BFA, and plans to work at a gallery and establish her professional studio as a freelance artist.