To know Helga Browne-Scarlett the painter, one needs to visit her in her chosen surroundings in Camel Valley and Big Sur. Her studio where she receives visitors is in a converted shed from the old Scarlett Dairy. The house she lives in, called "The Barn", is just that, the dairy's barn converted into an elegant rustic home. However, Helga's artistic "muse" comes from an inaccessible area of Big Sur called Wild Cattle Creek where she has a cabin calledHeaven Hill. Here, no one but her husband Eric or beloved feline companion interrupts her work.

"My artwork is so small because I have to hike all materials in and out of the woods to the cabin either on foot or horseback," says the diminutive artist who doesn't, from all outward appearances, have the stamina to climb hills, never mind mountains with a back pack and her inseparable companion, the cat. Nor is it easy to visualize this elegant woman in her hiking clothes!

But to the cabin she goes with her paint brushes where she works with watercolors, mixed media and collages. "Sometimes I get cut off from the rest of the world, once as much as two months," she says, staying on her property in a canyon without electricity, telephone or water line. "My energy is solar, my water pumped by generator and my communication via CB, there being no cellular service in the area."

But this solitude is what Helga seeks at this stage of her life. "I had a successful business for 18 years in Monterey called Esthetic Skin Care and Makeup and, 9 years ago, married a wonderful man, Eric Scarlett." As a wedding present, Eric built her a small house that they called "Heaven Hill", a rustic retreat Helga surrounded with a profusion of color in terraced gardens. She filled this cabin high atop Big Sur's Wild Cattle Creek with linens and lace from her native Germany and imported antique cabinets and chairs, hand-hewn tables and the bedstead. On each, as well as on the exposed beams and support columns, Helga painted flowers and vines-- painstaking artistry known as Bauern Malerei, taught to her by her father as a child in a small town near Frankfurt, Germany. And on the little hand-painted table by her bed, she laid her mother's German family bible. Here she first started to paint again, to create her own bit of Bavaria.

But then disaster struck. Early on the morning of October 7, 1996, that year's Big Sur fire became more than an eerie red glow on the horizon. It came up the side of the canyon so quickly and razed her retreat, that Helga and Eric barely had time to get out with their lives. The fire burned so hot, that even the claw-foot tub was evaporated.

For nearly a year, Helga mourned the loss of her cabin, her sanctuary, and especially her mother's mementos. She finally realized that she could not devote her life to "things". On making that decision, she made plans to retire and sold her business. "I needed to make things different, to live without a time schedule, not locked into work, more free," Helga says. "This was the hardest thing I did in my life, to let go of people I had worked with-many of whom are still mad at me because they didn't understand," she adds. "It was tough to sell the business and the little building it was in, but I just had to downsize my life. It took over 2 years to get my life in order, but now I'm happy I did it."

What Helga and Eric also did was build the tiny little cabin on the ashes of the former house on the Big Sur property. For a third time she started to paint, this time taking as much time out of her life for this endeavor as she wants. But this time, Helga is more aware of techniques and has been studying at workshop's and training classes by Jennifer Allen, Ada Fine and Robert Regis Dvorak. They have given her tremendous insight into her possibilities because, as Helga describes herself, "I'm not a painter by history of art, I'm just a soul inspired by creative outlets. I've always enjoyed painting, going into my own world, doing my own thing."

"At first I painted just for myself because it gave me enjoyment and pleasure," she says, but since she has been selling her art at several galleries, "I like it when other people find pleasure in it as well, and buy it. It's very rewarding and inspiring."

"Now I never stop creating-- I pick up little things I find that I can use in my collages," Helga says excitedly, picking up different materials from her worktable such as paper and tissue which she layers, putting them together into an image. "They are a composition made from various materials and images, a construction created out of the clutter of modern life; some even say they are a metaphor for modern life," she says. "I have an idea when I start a piece, but then I also surprise myself when I go off on something totally different--and the end effect is always wonderful to me."

"And, yes, I intend to stay with the small sizes as long as I work in the remote Heaven's Hill,Big Sur environment; they are easy to carry, but also I love to do small detailed work, and my prices of the pieces remain very affordable." Helga's art is priced at around $100.00 for the small pieces, "perfect as accessory pieces to larger artwork, or small groupings of two or three." She now paints in watercolor, acrylics, mixed media and collages.

Helga Browne-Scarlett's paintings can be found in private collections as well as public galleries throughout the United States and Europe. Her work here in Monterey County can be seen at the following galleries: