About the Artist

Pat Siuda is a 68 year old emerging artist, born and raised in Buffalo New York. She moved to Western North Carolina in 1976 and never looked back. She claims she was born in the wrong place, that she was meant to be born in the mountains.  She is truly inspired by the beauty of the Western North Carolina area.

In her younger days, she trained and showed horses in Hhunter and Dressage, even winning 2 National Top 10's and a Regional Championship in Arabian/Half Arabian Competition. She also showed successfully in open National Competition in Dressage up to 4th Level and was schooling into the international levels at home. Her little 15 hand Half Arabian held his own against the much bigger, fancier warmbloods.  For about 25 years, she trained, showed and taught riding lessons. These years proved to be valuable artistic stimulation for Pat's future.

When age got the best of her, Pat began doing Computer Aided Design for the textile industry. It was a good fit, since from an early age, art had been her hobby and constant past time.  She also was intrigued by the technical aspect of the weaves, looms and weaving. Her textile career lasted 30 plus years, overlapping with her equestrian career, before she took an early retirement to pursue fine art.

A local college campus offered a wide variety of art classes, which Pat happily took advantage of from 2017 to 2019. At ICC's Polk Campus she studied drawing, pen and ink, watercolor, oil and more. Even though Pat had done artwork all her life, this was the first formal art training she had ever had. Pat works in a variety of mediums, doing everything from pet portraits and equestrian art to landscapes and wildlife. She considers herself a nature artist, rather than an animal artist.

In 2018, Pat was selected to participate in Tammy Tappan's artist residency program at Equine Instincts Gallery at The Tryon International Equestrian Center. That was a wonderful experience for her. She came and never went home. Being in that environment connected all the things Pat loved most in life...horses and horse show activities, and horsey people and art and artsy people. It was a great place to be. Who knows what the future will hold for Pat.