Gay Summer Rick creates atmospheric scenes that reveal an unexpected beauty in commonplace elements within the urban coastal landscape. Sparsely populated, leaning toward abstraction, her paintings capture the energy and movement of the observable world, describing the quiet vibration of life where the city meets the sea. Guided by a deep commitment to sustainability, Rick employs innovative techniques to minimize her environmental impact. She applies pure oil paint using only palette knives and treats the paint architectonically, layering, carving, and accumulating it, but never discarding. In this way, she completely avoids toxic solvents and prevents material waste. Originally from New York, Gay Summer Rick received a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from the New York State College of Ceramics at Alfred University, and a Master’s degree from the University of Puget Sound. Her work has been exhibited in museums and galleries across the US, Europe, and Japan. She is a member of Oil Painters of America, California Art Club, and Malibu Art Association. Her paintings have been featured in American Art Collector Magazine, HYPERALLERGIC, Huffington Post, ARTNOWLA, Artillery Magazine, Chronicle Luxembourg, Malibu Magazine, Malibu Times, and others, and in several books and exhibition catalogs. She is a Center for Creative Innovation grant recipient, a Getty grant recipient, and a Kipaipai Fellow. Rick’s art and practice are the subject of short documentary films including “Iconic LA and the Urban Coast”, and “Follow the Sun” sponsored by a grant from the Museum of Art and History, Lancaster, California. Her paintings are in corporate and private collections around the world. A resident of Malibu for over 25 years, Rick normally maintains studios in Inglewood and Malibu. The Palisades Fire, which devastated a large swath of Malibu in January 2025 rendered her Malibu studio and home unusable. From this experience a new body of work emerged from her Inglewood studio that celebrates resilience in the face of uncertainty, embraces moments of joy, and describes an inexorable beauty that is life in Malibu.