About

California-based artist Robyn Palescandolo (signed R Palesca) creates expressive realist paintings exploring the timeless beauty of everyday things. Her paintings offer collectors a unique connection to nature, capturing emotion and light through the subtle forms of botanicals and imperfect natural objects.

Biography

Robyn Palescandolo (signed R. Palesca) is an American studio artist based in Southern California. Through a classically inspired process, her work combines precise realist detail with spontaneous, painterly brushwork. Botanicals, natural objects, and quietly observed subjects transform the familiar into something timeless, intimate, and deeply felt.

 

Robyn holds a magna cum laude BA in Art History from Boston University and an MA in Art History & Visual Culture from Lindenwood University, where she received the Art History Award for Honors Convocation. She studied oil painting under Marilou van Lierop at Academie Noord in Flanders and spent years in the studio learning to balance traditional academic techniques with her unique creative voice. From 2016 to 2021, Robyn owned and operated La Locanda del Tempo, a farmhouse and painting retreat in rural Italy dedicated to slow living, artistic restoration, and immersive study. The retreat’s ethos continues to shape her work, rooted in stillness, simplicity, and close observation. Alongside her studio practice, she teaches classical painting workshops, serves on the Board of Directors for San Diego Art Directory, and maintains active membership in several local and international professional artist associations.

 

Robyn’s work has been exhibited and recognized by respected arts organizations, including the International Guild of Realism, Oil Painters of America, California Art Club, Luxembourg Art Prize, and Art Renewal Center. Her work and artistic philosophy have been featured in media such as Create! Magazine, VoyageLA Magazine, and American Art Collector. Her botanical illustrations are held at the KAUST Center for Desert Agriculture, and fine artworks are held in private collections internationally.

Artist Statement

  • I am deeply inspired by simplicity, the honesty of things shown as they are. In recent years, both my life and work have shifted toward a slower, more meditative rhythm, shaped in part by a period of healing and quiet return: a transformation that has softened not only how I live, but how I see.

     

    There is a quiet beauty that exists in imperfect, everyday objects: flowers past their peak, fruit from the garden, small natural forms that might otherwise go unnoticed. Through close observation, I seek to distill their essence in a way that reveals something deeper. In this way, my subjects become spaces for reflection, where light, atmosphere, and subtle shifts in form carry emotional weight.

     

    My process moves between spontaneity and control. I begin loosely, allowing the paint to move freely, then gradually refine the image in slow and deliberate layers. There's a careful balance between building a convincing reality while honoring the structure underneath, trying to resolve just enough, never too much. I want to show some of the messy beginnings alongside the finished detail work, because they are all part of the journey and all hold equal weight. So, edges dissolve, forms soften, and early brushwork remains visible. It is within this balance that the work feels most alive to me.

     

    I do not seek to capture perfection, but a moment of presence through quiet markers of time, memory, and attention. My work offers a moment of stillness: an invitation to slow down, look more closely, and rediscover the beauty that exists in plain sight.

     

    - Robyn Palescandolo (signed R Palesca)

Awards & Honors

  • Semi-finalist

    Art Renewal Center’s International Salon

  • Finalist, The Woman Artist Award

    Arts to Hearts Project's International Selection

  • Certificate of Merit

    Luxembourg Art Prize’s International Selection

  • Juried Artist Member

    International Guild of Realism

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