Margret E. Short Fine Arts

Portland, Oregon artist Margret Short - a modern day master of 17th Century Dutch art using the chiaroscuro technique to create still life and floral paintings.

Oregon artist Margret E. Short specializes in still life/floral and portraits, and recently expanded her repertoire to include landscapes.

Short is a Signature Member of Oil Painters of America and a Master Signature Member of American Women Artists. In 2018, she was honored with the Samuel T. Shaw Memorial Award at the Salmagundi Club Annual Juried Members Exhibit in New York City. In March of 2019, Margret received an Award of Excellence at the Virtuosos of the Oil Painters of America in St. Augustine, Florida.

Margret has also been awarded four first prize awards at the Salmagundi Club: in 1998, 2005, 2010, and 2012. In 2014, Margret won a coveted Honorable Mention Award from Exhibit Juror David Leffel at the Salon International in San Antonio. In 1998, Ms. Short won the Director’s Purchase Prize at Wichita’s National Small Oil Painting Exhibit. Short has captured many other awards, including the Grumbacher Gold Medallion at the 1999 Oil Painters of America Exhibit in Scottsdale, AZ.

Memberships and Presentations

  • Salmagundi Club New York City – Member, 1998 – present
  • American Women Artists – Board of Directors, 2012
  • American Women Artists – Master Signature Member, 2012
  • 10th Annual North Carolina Market Show, Timeless Style and Design – Guest Speaker, 2009
  • Dayton Art Institute – Guest Presenter: Lessons from the Low Countries, Rembrandt and the Golden Age of Dutch Art Exhibit, Dayton, Ohio, 2006
  • Oil Painters of America – Signature Member, 1998

Selected Exhibits and Special Recognition

  • Oil Painters of America National Exhibition, California Art Museum, Escondido, CA, 2021  
  • American Artists Professional League, Spring Exhibition, 2021
  • National Acrylic and Oil Painters, Spring Exhibition, 2021
  • Salmagundi Club, Spring Juried Members Exhibition, NY 2021
  • Oil Painters of America Western Regional, St. George, UT, Fall 2020
  • Oil Painters of America Salon Exhibit, Fall 2020
  • Salmagundi Club Virtual Member Exhibit Spring, New York City, NY, 2020                            
  • Virtuosos of the Oil Painters of America Award of Excellence, March 2019
  • Oil Painters of America Western Regional, Boulder, CO, 2018                                                                                                                  
  • Salmagundi Club Juried Members Exhibit, Awarded the Samuel T. Shaw  Memorial, New York City, NY, 2018
  • Oil Painters of America National, Steamboat Springs, CO, 2018
  • Virtuosos of the Oil Painters of America at the Salmagundi Club, New York City, NY, 2015
  • Oil Painters of America Western Regional, Carmel, CA
  • Salon International, San Antonio, TX, 2014
  • Salmagundi Club, Members Exhibit, NY, 2014
  • Oil Painters of America Inaugural Salon, Petoskey, MI, 2013
  • American Women Artists, Visions of the Southwest Exhibit, Sonoran Museum, AZ, 2012
  • Salon International, San Antonio, TX, 2012
  • Salon International, San Antonio, TX, 2011
  • Oil Painters of America National, Scottsdale, AZ, 2010
  • Masters in Miniature, CM Russell Museum, Great Falls, MT, 2010
  • Oregon Public Broadcasting Art Beat, Featured Artist, 2007, 2006, 2003
  • Parker Foundation, Featured Artist for Undiscovered Italy, 2005
See Margret’s Full Resume´

In early 2021, Short gained membership in the National Oil and Acrylic Painters Society, the American Artists Professional League, and the American Impressionist Society, and will exhibit all three juried shows in 2021.

Ms. Short has always been captivated by Rembrandt’s harmonious color mixtures. In 2007, Margret produced her splendid series, Lessons from the Low Countries. This project was inspired by the color palettes of eleven select paintings in the exhibit, Rembrandt and the Golden Age of Dutch Art, which traveled to 3 U.S. cities in 2006/07. For her series, Margret replicated 17th century paints for her own collection by hand grinding each pigment. Luscious colors grace each bountiful still life, with magical names like lapis lazuli, cinnabar, azurite, burnt sienna, and malachite.

In a game of hide and seek, Ms. Short recreates and references the precise original Rembrandt pigments by sprinkling them into her series for perceptive viewers to find.

This entire project can be viewed at www.margretshort.com with detailed documentation, including historical pigment research and images of all completed paintings. This nearly sold-out exhibit was presented as a One Woman Exhibit in Portland, Oregon, in June 2007.

After a trip to Egypt in 2009, Margret was captivated by yet another set of intriguing colors. However, for this project, it was not Rembrandt’s palette but that of the Pharaohs. To create this new collection of 12 paintings, Lessons from the Pharaoh’s Tomb, in-depth research began by studying pigments used in the tombs and temples of ancient Egypt from 3500 BCE. This nearly sold-out exhibit inspired a subsequent third pigment series, Lessons from the Pharaoh’s Tomb Part Two.

Subsequently, in 2012, a fourth series titled Lessons from the Spider Woman was created using pigments from the Southwest Native American culture. A Greek 500 BCE historic pigment project followed shortly after, with many more to come in the.                                                                                   

Margret earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Marylhurst University, Portland, Oregon, and taught painting and drawing classes at Clackamas Community College in Oregon City, Oregon, 1980-90. She also taught private lessons to many students.. Her work is in many private collections in the USA  and beyond.