Bio

Brandy Walega (pronounced wah-LEE-gah) (she/hers) is a Denver-based visual artist, focusing on abstract acrylic painting and mixed media collage. She is originally from Michigan and has lived in Colorado since 1998.

A childhood of craftiness, reading, collecting, and organizing laid the foundation for writing poetry and being a mostly self-taught artist. Creative expression became a refuge, a voice and visual journal, and fuel for next life steps time after time.

Brandy earned a BA in Written Communications and minor in Women’s Studies, from Eastern Michigan University in Ypsilanti, Michigan; a MA in Transpersonal Counseling Psychology with a concentration in Art Therapy from Naropa University in Boulder, Colorado; and an AS in Baking and Pastry from Johnson and Wales University in Denver, Colorado. She worked with survivors of domestic and sexual violence in multiple roles – therapist, advocate, and trainer/technical assistance provider for other advocates – for over 24 years, primarily in non-profits. She made the shift to full-time artist in fall 2023, to support her health and pursue her long-time creative passions.

She has used art in powerful personal and professional ways. Personally, she creates from a place of necessity, as there is consistently a texture or color waiting to emerge and pursue with curiosity. Sometimes she uses art as a mode of self-exploration of her own health issues, and other times as a way to ground while working with survivors of traumas. Professionally, she has had the honor of working with hundreds of survivors of domestic and sexual violence, and used art as a narrative, as a safe container, and as part of the healing process.

Brandy emphatically believes that art is healing for both artists and audiences through creating, witnessing, and listening. Currently, her art explores human relationships with ourselves and with others, and uses visual and physical textures and layers to represent the complexity of people.