After three decades making images for brands, Michelle Talbot returned to painting, the medium she started with at the Rhode Island School of Design. Her design career spanned art direction, creative direction and product design, including Kidzaw, a line of art kits she invented to teach children to paint their own versions of master works, sold in museum shops including The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Museum of Modern Art and The Art Institute of Chicago. Today she paints from her studio at the Bridgeport Art Center in Chicago, where she is a resident artist. Her paintings focus on people: figures, faces and the moments when someone is simply themselves. In a time of filters and curated images, she paints people as they really are. Her work was recently shown in the 14th Annual Bridgeport Art Center Art Competition and Insight: BAC Artists’ Exhibition.