Jan Welda Tong is a native Californian, born in Los Angeles in 1950. She grew up among the dairy farms of Wisconsin, the deserts of Arizona, and various places in the Golden State of California. Jan has lived and worked in New York and Florida, and has traveled extensively. Since 1996 she has resided in Hawaiʻi, first on the island of Maui and currently on Oʻahu’s windward shore.Jan has been drawing and painting since she was very young, experimenting with many different media but always coming back to oils, pen and ink, and etching. One of her first awards was a blue ribbon for first prize in oils, given on April 8, 1967, at the Los Gatos, California Art Association Juried Member’s Show.Jan studied oil painting at school and at Saratoga’s Villa Montalvo Arts Center. She’s won various other awards, including the Mayor’s Choice Award in the Carmel, California Art Festival on May 18, 1995, and has been included in Art Maui. Jan has also been a featured artist at Haiku’s Ho’olaulea and Flower Festival, at Hotel Wailea, and at the Art of Real Estate in Kihei, Maui. She has participated in Seabury Hall’s Aloha Art Gallery and many other shows, and has work in many private and public collections worldwide, including works at Kaiser Permanente in Vacaville, California. Four galleries currently represent her - Hana Coast Gallery, Maui; NaPua Gallery in the Grand Wailea, Maui; Haiku Style, in the Haiku Cannery, Maui, and Sunshine Arts, Inc., in Kāneʻohe, Oʻahu.Some of Jan’s favorite artists include Johannes Vermeer, Rembrandt, Albrecht Durer, Mary Cassatt and Winslow Homer. There are numerous artists in Jan’s family, including her niece Gina Borg of Oakland, California, her daughter Christina Fleetham of Diamond Springs, California, and her great-great grandfather Danford Alfonso Hanshaw, who is buried in Petaluma, California.Jan hopes that her images of beautiful, calming natural scenes will bring peace, light and clarity to many people.