Meet Brenda Fineman | Artist, Certified Bob Ross Instructor, and Small Business Owner

We had the good fortune of connecting with Brenda Fineman and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Brenda, can you walk us through the thought-process of starting your business?
I wanted to bring more of the arts to my community. While there are plenty of art venues/events/classes for people to take part in, they are often a bit of a drive for someone in this area (Chelsea, Mi) and quite expensive or not designed for the casual artist. I wanted to bring the joy and feeling one gets from painting and creating something to all skill levels and all age groups.

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
I work mostly in oils creating landscapes since I am certified as an instructor in that field. However, I love branching out and working with watercolors, acrylics, and other mediums. I actually had never really worked with oils before deciding to become certified as a Bob Ross instructor. I won’t say it was easy, but studying Bob Ross’ technique and having grown up watching him on tv helped. One of the things Bob always said was that anyone can paint. And he’s right, but you do need to practice. If you want to learn the best way to do something, to get the best result, you have to keep practicing, paying attention to the details. You can’t just pick up a pallet knife or fan brush and hold it any way you want expecting the same result as what Bob did; it may seem awkward at first but the more you practice the better you will get. You have to build muscles in art too! I love creating and encouraging others to create. It’s not always about what the end result looks like but how it makes you feel when you do it. Get lost in the creation of it and come out feeling new and alive.

People often ask me about my studio name: Geek Brush Studio. I decided to name my studio that for a few reasons. Art can be part of geek culture and Bob Ross is definitely someone who people get geeked about. I also love other areas of geek culture such as video games such as Valheim and shows like Doctor Who and books such as Dungeon Crawler Carl or any book by Neal Stephenson just to name a few. I enjoy creating paintings that represent or rather inspired by those parts of me as well.

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
Chelsea is a gorgeous town surrounded by lot of beauty. I think we would start our day with a little coffee and breakfast at Zou Zou’s followed by a nature outing either at the Gerald E. Eddy Discovery Center for a nature walk or at the DTE bike trail if they were into riding bikes. We’d follow that up by picking up lunch at Mike’s Deli for some of the best sandwiches and taking them to one of the many parks in the surrounding area for a picnic. There are some lovely shops in downtown
Chelsea where one can enjoy all manner of shopping from clothing to tchotchkes to art. I would also love to take them to a show at the Purple Rose theater (if we are lucky, maybe Jeff Daniels will be there!) Pre-dinner drinks can be had at Ugly Dog followed by dinner at either the Common Grill or the Grateful Crow. For a small town, there is quite of few interesting places to grab a drink or food, it’s sometimes hard to make a choice!

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
First and foremost, my husband, Ben Fineman, deserves a big shoutout. It was through his support that I was able to attend a 3-week certification class in Muncie, IN for my certification as a Bob Ross Instructor and really it was his scrolling through Reddit that discovered one could even get certified in that area. I also need to shoutout to my bookclub! They were the ones who encouraged the idea of me teaching painting classes after participating in a Zoom bookclub meeting where I walked them through how to paint something during the pandemic. And, of course, all of my family from my mom to my kids to my sisters and in-laws, they all helped in various ways of encouragement and more!

Website: https://www.geekbrushstudio.com/

Instagram: @geekbrushstudio

Facebook: @geekbrushstudio

Youtube: @geekbrushstudio8699

Other: Twitch: @geekbrushstudio