Marissa Voytenko on encaustic painting, creation as a practice of prayer and the simple joy of color

Marissa Voytenko seeks to bring comfort and beauty through her paintings and sculptures. Marissa has been painting with encaustic, a molten wax medium, for over a decade.   In this conversation, Marissa shares about how her art practice is a practice of meditation, of prayer in which she holds within her consciosuness the suffering in our world as she creates.  Although our conversation took place before the invasion of the Ukraine, where she lived for three years and has many loved ones, her current instagram shares about her art process during the current tragedies of the war. She is selling art to raise money for Doctors Without Boarders in Ukraine.  Originally from California, Marissa received training at the California State Summer School for the Arts.  In 2003, Marissa earned a Master of Fine Art in Studio Teaching at Boston University. She has exhibited work both nationally and internationally.  Marissa resides with her family in the Chicago area and is an adjunct professor at Wheaton College.   Marissa's work can be found online at www.marissavoytenko.com/ or on instragram at www.instagram.com/marissavoytenko/.  Become a patreon of the Return to Embodiment Podcast: www.patreon.com/returntoembodiment