My backround is unusual. My father is European, from what was formerly Czechoslovakia and my mother is Italian from Tripoli, Libya. Like many immigrants of their generation, they left their homes and moved away looking to start a new and better life. My father made his way to Israel, then South America and eventually New York. My mother left Tripoli when she was fairly young, also went to Israel, and finally joined an older sister in New York, where she met my father. Between them they speak about six or seven languages. They settled, however, in sunny Puerto Rico where they raised three daughters. I moved to Philadelphia when I started college at the University of Pennsylvania. While at Penn I took many drawing and art history courses and graduated in 1988 with a pre-architecture major and an art history minor.
Upon graduating, I worked in an architectural model building firm and then left to do magazine and newsletter editing and layout. Marriage soon followed and while I was expecting my first child, we moved from Philadelphia to Massachusetts where my husband started his own business. Today we have three beautiful boys that keep me very busy. And while I have always tried to fit in time to paint, it is only in the last few years that I have been able to devote more time to it.
I work in both oils and acrylics and paint a variety of subject matter. However, I am partial to the figure, working mostly from live models although sometimes from sketches. My studio is in the historic Saxonville Mills, in Framingham at 1602B Concord Street, Framingham, MA 10701.
Email: Ruthiehelwig@hotmail.com
Saxonville Studios, 1602B Concord Street, Framingham, MA 10701
