Holly Hope Banks is an award-winning artist with classical art training. She graduated in 1981 at the University of Toledo, where she earned her Bachelor's of Art degree. She then spent five years as a registered copyist at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. She studied with Daniel Greene in New York and later honed her skills at the Atelier of Plein-air Studies with four years of formal academic training. Ms. Banks furthered her studies by extensive travels to Europe.

Her work has been shown and awarded at prestigious exhibitions at the National Arts Club and the Salmagundi Club in New York. In 1996, she was one of five American artists invited to Russia by the Union of Russian Artists to paint and exhibit her work. Holly's portrait of Ms. Ramona Tumblin was selected for the Best of Portrait Painting North light Books, 1998. She was featured in American Artist Magazine, October 1998 and will be featured in an article for October 2001. In 2000, she had work exhibited in the 62nd Midyear Exhibition at The Butler Museum of American Art, and currently has work featured in their 63rd Midyear Exhibition. She is listed in Who's Who in America, Who's Who in American Art, Who's Who of American Women, and Who's Who in the World.

Ms. Banks is a full member of Audubon Artists, American Society of Classical Realism and Art Renewal Center. She is represented by several galleries in the South and has her work in important collections across the country.

Ms. Banks' portrait drawings in pencil are sensitive, exquisitely crafted, and reminiscent of the great 19th Century portraitist, Ingres. Her paintings reflect her love of color harmony, design and attention to detail. She also admires the great English portrait painters of the 18th century and the French Naturalist painters. Holly embraces the principles of the Romantic realists and strives to keep that tradition alive in her own portraits. She has been painting portraits for the past twelve years. She lives with her artist husband and works out of her studio in Clearwater, Florida.