The passion driving Amanda “Rusti” Burkman flows from a love of music, a deep connection with community, and an intense desire to bring more beauty into the world through artwork. By infusing these aesthetics into a new style of painting, she developed her ongoing “Paint Chip Mosaic Series.” Each painting in this series has its own allure, depth, and meaning but still is physically intertwined with the paintings that have come before. By reusing dried paint scraped off of her marble easel, Rusti creates a vivid palette that breathes new life into the colors. She captures the essence of her subjects as these fragments—each beautifully unique—come together and fuse to become whole. Paintings range from figurative to abstract and often portray landscapes, portraits of people she greatly admires or who have been major influences on her, and surrealism that reflects the human form within the exquisite patterns of nature.