orn in San Francisco in 1961, Nila (whose name is the Hindi word for blue sky) grew up with a fascination for cloud formations.

Many different houses, neighborhoods and views punctuated her Bay Area childhood. Her transient youth encouraged her to use the land, specifically the rolling California hills, to provide a sense of place and home.

As early as age thirteen she was taking classes at California College of Arts and Crafts. Later, at the University of California at Santa Cruz, influenced by the Society of Six who painted plein aire, she spent time painting landscapes out of doors. In 1983 she earned a double major in Art and Art History from UCSC.

Although she was inspired by the California landscape and the Pacific ocean, Nila was determined to experience a grittier, more urban existence. She moved to Manhattan directly after college graduation. The next seven years she painted dark, conceptual abstracts. By 1989 these atmospheric abstract paintings had developed distinct horizon lines. She had come full circle to paint landscapes again. Conscious of her need for a more peaceful life than the one she was living in New York, Nila returned to San Francisco.

In 1991 the Marin Headlands Center for the Arts provided an intense period of spiritual growth and recovery for Nila. Her previously heavy palette and subject matter gave way to lighter work. The paintings from this period combine her interest in text, religion, and visual expansiveness and surround the viewer in heavenly clouds.

A few years later, after she moved to a live/work studio in Benicia, California, she began to create more traditional, but still atmospheric, landscapes. In Benicia Nila found continuing inspiration in a balance of community, land, space and simplicity. Her work conveys both her journey as an artist and the peaceful awe she experiences in nature.

Currently Nila lives in Oakland with her architect husband Tom Oakes and his two sons. She continues to paint her spiritually generous landscapes in her Oakland studio.

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