Alicia Leeke, a native South Carolinian, started her artistic studies under Steven Nevitt at Columbia College. During her sophomore year she vacationed in Paris and visited the Louve, where she fell in love with the French Impressionists. She also visited her most inspiring spot in France, Montmarte.

Her travels to paint landscapes during plein-air painting sessions led her to produce a body of beautiful abstract paintings inspired by nature’s ever-changing scenery.

More recently, her work has been inspired by photographers Susan Kae Grant of Texas and John E. Powell of Columbia, SC and inspired her work in series to produce a body of work combining conceptual art, photography and digital mixed media.

Leeke compares a series of art in a body of work to that of multiple product lines in sales. This means she has a paintings produced in a series over time including: abstract textural landscapes, impressionistic landscapes, French cityscapes, digital mixed media cityscapes, vibrant abstracts and soon an abstract body of work based on phytoplanketon.

Leeke was awarded a grant by the Charleston Scientific and Cultural Education Fund to produce a traveling exhibition in 2015 entitled: View from Under the Microscope: Science-based Learning Through Art. The exhibition will educate the non-scientific community about the importance Phytoplankton play in our life and why we need to be good stewards of our water bodies.