Flowers and Fluid Movement

Local Great Falls artist Sheree Nelson, @sartnleson, joined us for her 4^th ArtsFest MONTANA mural festival. Located on the back of 614 Central Ave, this may be one of Sheree’s largest pieces yet. Funded by a grant from the Montana Arts Council. Sheree didn’t shy away from the massive blank walls she faced; she completed this beautiful, flowery mural in five days! 

Ricky Watts created his Fluid Movement Artsfest MONTANA mural in 2021, in back of 618 Central Ave. He flirted with multiple painting styles for a number of years before developing his current abstract style of colors and movement. This came about in 2012, as a deconstruction of the letter shapes he was producing on canvas at the time. It was a lightbulb moment for Ricky and he put everything else on hold to follow the path of this new-formed style.Today, Ricky’s colorful large-scale murals and intricate paintings on canvas can be found throughout the United States.

In 2022, Sheree Nelson was one of five Great Falls artists to receive a $10,000 grant through the Montana Arts Council and the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) to complete an art project. Renowned muralist Cameron Moberg, in partnership with NeighborWorks Great Falls, created the first downtown murals as part of ArtsFest in 2018. Moberg reached out to Nelson for help. She became part of the project, which has turned into an annual event, which was the catalyst that got Nelson back into making art. It took her outside her comfort zone, and she said it got her focused less on herself and more on the community.

Nelson said she didn’t know which building she’d get but knew as soon as The Living Room came up that she wanted it. She had already painted a mural inside the salon and did similar flowers when she painted the outside. “It just all came together,” she said. Anyone wanting to commission her can reach her through Facebook at www.facebook.com/shereenelsonart or on Instagram at @sartnelson. Her website is currently getting a facelift, too.

Born 1980 in San Francisco, California, Ricky Watts' obsession with art began at an early age. As a child, he loved comics, especially doodling his own. Most often involving glorious battles between the U.S. Army and nuclear dinosaurs. In school, he drew his peers' names in exchange for bartered items. By high school, his entrepreneurial efforts were funding his daily lunches. High school was also when Watts discovered the underground world of graffiti art. Fascinated with spray paint as a medium, he became fully engaged in creating elaborate pieces under the cover of night. After graduation, he traveled up and down the west coast, painting large-scale pieces on every surface he could find. His commissions list includes work for well-known technology, fashion and automotive companies. His commissions list includes work for well-known technology, fashion and automotive companies. Ricky Watts currently works out of his Northern California studio and spends his “free time” raising energetic twin boys.