Darla Farner was born in East Chicago and has been an Oregon resident since 1979. She has worked in the hospitality food service industry for over twenty-five years, as well as in the medical field (front and back office) for fifteen years. She followed her urge to paint and attended a workshop through Portland State University, where an award-winning artist taught her how to paint using experimental watercolor. Since then she has developed her own style. Since the summer of 1998, she's created nearly 200 mixed media paintings on 22 x 30 hot compressed, museum quality, archival paper.