Professional artist Denise Buisman Pilger (the -Artist Abroad) is a frequent globetrotter. Having called Amsterdam, Fort Worth, Montréal and Nagoya home, she takes each relocation as an opportunity to explore the world, gathering inspiration for her urban, hand layered mixed media paintings along the way. Exhibiting and selling her work prolifically in North America and Europe over the past several years, Denise has proudly exhibited her work at the 2011 Salon de la Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts at the Carrousel du Louvre in Paris, both the Artist Project and Outdoor Art Exhibition in Toronto and galleries in New York, Montréal, Ottawa and Toronto.

Denise's work reflects her love of photography, painting and travel, configured into graphic pseudo-realities of everyday life filtered through her own whimsical creative lens. Fascinated by the urban landscape and the people that populate it, her bustling pastiches of architectural elements and city life invite us to step into her world, where urban elements are arranged at unusual angles, irregular scale, and not necessarily in their true-to-life configuration.

Her creative practice spans close to two decades, beginning with several years as a professional graphic designer and art director for print media, both in Europe and North America. A sensibility that is reflected in her current body of work, both aesthetically and technically. Her creative process involves photo manipulation, acrylic image Transfer, hand layered mixed media elements and other innovative techniques. Often her pieces are black and white with minimalist colour accents, while others abound with colour — her visual vocabulary is always unique and always authentic. From her home-based studio, she produces cityscapes that are graphic and contemporary, yet nostalgic.

Originally from Amsterdam, the Netherlands, Denise has a Bachelor of Arts in Illustration from Willem de Kooning Academy of Arts in Rotterdam. She continues to pursue creative professional development to stay on top of new techniques and materials as well as find inspiration in the classic local techniques and materials of her current home country.