Carol Wallace

American artist Carol Wallace has been a creator for nearly 35 years. She began her professional career as a gallery artist, represented by art galleries in New England, Bucks County, Pennsylvania, Charlotte, North Carolina, and SoHo, New York City. Through the years she had added to her repertoire by becoming a prolific commission artist, illustrator, and designer with licensing selected work to publishing companies and manufacturers of decorative giftware. The artist’s strength is diversity, as she is able to achieve different looks, from dreamy impressionism and representational realism to whimsical illustrative works. She particularly enjoys the challenge of working with her diverse clientele on custom projects to make their visions a reality.

Carol draws her inspiration from her extensive travel across the United States and to international locales.

In 1997 Carol founded a far-reaching venture called Preserve America®, which is a combination of fine art and preservation of the history and tradition of Americana. The artist’s photographic and writing skills dovetail with this venture. She has been able to create, with her colleagues, merchandise that is used for many purposes. Education, public service, and philanthropy are very important aspects of Carol’s Preserve America venture. As the Director of Preserve America and the associated Gatekeepers of History, she has traveled to over 1,500 towns and cities across America since 2000, after partnering with her first Preserve America associates, Crane & Company, and their Excelsior Printing division. She currently works with many other associates, including The Journeyman Press, from Newburyport, Massachusetts…a high-end, state-of-the-art printing / mailing / fulfillment company.

The artist documents many aspects of Americana through her national custom “world-class” note card and poster line called The Preserve America Collection. Two and three-paneled note cards, covered with paintings and drawings (combined with detailed histories on the back) and elaborate montage posters, are just a part of the Collection. A new line, utilizing Carol’s photographs of national parks, surrounded by her pen and ink drawings pertinent to the picture, is the newest addition.

The original art she paints for Preserve America have a mission. These images have a life of their own, apart from her one-of-a-kind gallery art, and are used in a variety of ways. The note cards and montage posters, reproduced from the originals, are considered to be “emissaries of history” by preservationists and museum curators. They bring heightened awareness of different regions and historic sites in America, serve as an inspiration to others wanting to preserve, and are a source of income revenue for gift shops in museums, hotels and inns, and stationery stores across the nation.

In 2003, the significance of Carol’s Preserve America venture, to bring stories of historic and cultural heritage of America to people around the world, was recognized by First Lady Laura Bush who invited the artist to visit the White House and also to be one of her official greeters at her preservation initiative event in Portland, Maine.

Carol Wallace created the pen and ink illustration which was engraved onto the commemorative USPO First Day of Issue Covers released during the dedication of the National World War II Memorial in 2004. The Covers continue to be sold through the National World War II Memorial Web site. Carol created a painting of Ellis Island, which was used by the Statue of Liberty-Ellis Island Foundation to publish posters, note cards, and greeting cards which were sold for years on their American Family Immigration History Center Web site. The original is in the Foundation’s art collection. Concessionaire for the landmarks, Evelyn Hill Inc., chose Carol Wallace’s art for its 2013 Holiday cards. Two posters, the 2′ x 3′ two-sided Country Stores of Vermont poster and 28″ x 22″ Historic Bucks County poster, are in the permanent print collection of the Library of Congress. Selected Preserve America note cards and posters are used by the Smithsonian Institution’s Museum of American History for research and education purposes. Carol is a member of the United States Coast Guard Art Program.

In addition to being a professional artist, Carol is also known for coordinating large grassroots-corporate-governmental public service efforts where everyone works together for the good of the cause. Her best known work was for the 1982 State of Connecticut’s Better Yet Connecticut TV advertising campaign for heritage tourism. She was appointed by then-Governor William O’Neill to his Connecticut-Vacation Travel Council and named Executive Director of the entire ad campaign. Carol came up with the concept, lined up hundreds of volunteers across the state, including talented actors Paul Newman, Art Carney, Susan Saint James, June Havoc, musician Skitch Henderson, artist Eric Sloane, Mario Van Peebles, and others. Carol was the media spokesperson, raised the necessary funds, and oversaw the production to make this ad campaign a success. This tourism campaign was the first of its kind ever done.

Carol Wallace and her various ventures have been chronicled in numerous newspaper articles across the country, including four features in The New York Times. and some of her paintings are in art reference books. She is an elected member of the Society of Illustrators in New York City and has been listed in Who’s Who in American Art since 2007.

Carol recently wrote and illustrated her first book, a humorous novella for adults about a dog on the reality show circuit, entitled Daisy’s Reality Show Adventure. The print version was launched the end of last year at Pink’s Hot Dog Stand in Hollywood, California. The artist’s twenty illustrations are featured in the book.

Carol resides in northwestern Connecticut with her husband of 47 years, Rick Wallace, a retired attorney. In her spare time she enjoys traveling, writing her family’s history, cooking, music, reading, working on her various collections, and spending time with her children and four grandchildren. She is also a certified Justice of the Peace and occasionally performs weddings.