(revised Apr. 17,2009. Go to Recognition + Awards, and News-Events pages for current information and updates)

I am Janet Mach Dutton.   I was born the oldest of 7 children. I've been told I am related to both Polish and Russian aristocracy. My mother’s father fled from the Bolsheviks in 1917, eventually selling himself as an indentured slave to get from Africa to S. America, where he worked in the silver mines. He was twenty years older than my grandmother when he met and married her in Canada and moved to Detroit, Michigan. He was very old by the time I was ten. My father’s mother came to America from Poland, and died early leaving him to be raised on a farm near Port Huron, Michigan by his seven siblings. I have 35 first cousins.  I spent my childhood in the northeast suburbs of Detroit, Michigan. At the age of ten, I was in a car accident that killed my mother and 2 siblings (shaped an appreciation of life for me at an early age). My father remarried when I was twelve, divorced before I was eighteen and passed away in 1990. He was my best friend. I am sorry he is not here to share in my success and my life.

At fourteen, I won a scholarship to a summer art camp at Kansas University. My dad put me on a train (alone) in Detroit, I switched train terminals in Chicago and was picked up in Lawrence, Kansas at 1 am and taken to campus (this would never happen in today’s world).  In high school, I was awarded “governors choice” and my artwork was hung at the state capitol’s office. I graduated fourth out of 246 in my high school class , voted “most likely to succeed” and “most honest”.  I saved  baby sitting money (50 cents/hour) to buy a Sears sailboat ($200) and spent whatever free time I had in the summers sailing on Lake St. Clair.  I held jobs as a waitress, seat belt factory sewer, US postal carrier(on foot) through the fish fly covered streets, and student cook.  I quit a plastic injection plant after one week because I couldn’t handle the smell.  I graduated with honors from Michigan State University after transferring from Eastern Michigan University, and continued on to earn  a Masters Degree in art education, got married,  and after one year working as a advertising assistant at a Woolco store in Williamsburg, Va., took a teaching job with Bendle schools (Flint, Mi  suburb) teaching arts and culture to 6-12th grade students. I also taught some community classes in pottery and silk screening to adults in nearby communities. During my teaching years I was 9th grade class and student council sponsor, JV girls speedball coach (never knew what speedball was until I read the rules book), and JV girls basketball coach.  One of those girls I coached, Becky Nowak, twenty years later became my sister-in-law. During that time I also was a member of the Grand Blanc Arts Guild and served on the board of  Flint’s Left Bank Art Gallery where I sold my pottery and serigraphy. Just before I retired, one of my students came back to give me a hug and thank me for teaching him how to draw.  He had come back to Flint, after spending a few years as a successful tattoo artist in San Francisco, to get his GED.

Dad(Floyd Mach) + Janet	Fifteen years later at GM Parts Fab, Warren, Mi	Bendle H.S. painting murals after school hours.

Some things I learned about life: live today, knowing that there may not be a tomorrow (not in excess, but to its fullest). Experience life using all your senses! Find and enjoy the special talent that you have been given. My joy is in SEEING and TOUCHING. My talent is interpreting information and sharing it through my art media. Hopefully you will experience the CHARACTER I observe on an everyday basis. I find it surprisingly when it is least expected, so I am always with camera ready to capture the moment. In 1989, I met my husband after answering a personal ad in the newspaper. I sent him a list of the ten ideals I wanted from a man, the most important one. was I wanted a BEST FRIEND. He replied (told himself he could fake most of my ideals), took me to dinner, ran me (not to my knowledge) through a series of tests (food, interests, adaptability, teenagers, adventure etc.). I must have passed, because eight months later we were married. We blended Jerry's four children to my three to make a "Brady Bunch". He took me to San Antonio, Texas to attend Digestive Disease Week (he is a gastroenterologist)..got to find out just what he did as a doctor! Since turning 40 and marrying Jerry, we have shared a new world filled with awesome experiences. I have learned to downhill ski which has taken me on trips to Switzerland, Italy, Nevada, Wyoming, Colorado, and Canada and to snorkel (practiced in the bathtub first) and scuba dive. I currently have made over 130 dives taking underwater pictures in the Caribbean and Coral Seas, Great Barrier Reef of Australia, New Zealand's eastern coast, Mexico, and Hawaiian Islands.

Janet’s kids(1988) Kristin,Greg,Scott	Jerry’s kids: Gretchen, Michael, Todd, Robin	Janet up from a dive

Janet with koala In Australia	Sailing foul weather	Janet +Jerry New Zealand

We retired from our jobs in 2000, after sailing the great lakes for 10 years in a Morgan 30' ill- equipped-ocean-racer and moved all our "stuff" to Cape Coral, Florida. I decided to take up watercolors as my new art medium because it would easily travel. My first watercolor class was in Flint, Mi with Jim Ames just before changing our residence to Cape Coral, Florida. During this same time period, we bought a 50 foot ketch rigged sailboat, "Begin Again", and spent months in the Florida keys waiting for the weather to come around so we could cross the Gulf Stream to the Bahamas. Instead of going to the Bahamas, we had friends from Canada who invited us to cruise around the west end of Cuba. We sailed close to five months, enjoying the ports of Jamaica, Southern Haitian waters, and the Cayman islands before returning to our back door in Florida. In 2002 we sold the sailboat, bought a motor home and toured the New England coast and the Midwest. That's when I began to paint! My first series of successful paintings were completed while my husband worked for a veteran's hospital in Maine. I was able to get into the Ducktrap Bay Gallery in Camden, Maine.  Since then I have continued to paint when and where ever I can. We have sailed on the Alaskan intercoastal, Nile, and Yangtze rivers; crossed a Tibetan river in a yak-skinned boat; walked the great wall of china; snow mobiled Yellowstone National Park; canoed through cattle and bats in Belize; swung from vines in the trees of St. Vincent island; ate mahi mahi (they called every fish they caught mahi mahi) on banana leaves on the beach in Dominica; lost our dinghy and wrestled with a 6 foot lobster(not kidding) in the BVI's; hiked to remote ruins(Tikal) in Guatemala; abseiled 400 meters into the lost world of New Zealand..and spent 3 hours in waterfalls, full wet suits, crawling through narrow passages on hands and knees, climbing vertical walls to get back to the surface. I have touched a glacier in Alaska, rode a camel on the Sahara desert, backpacked Europe, mistakenly took a boat to Ischia instead of Capri, rode the canals of Venice in a gondola and the cable cars of San Francisco, dove the kelp beds in Monterey, got seasick and aborted a dive in Curacao (ate a local pizza with raisins and fish there that was wonderful!) caught a 44 LB halibut in Alaska, a 4 foot lesser hammerhead shark in Florida, a 45 LB striped marlin in Hawaii (watched the whales breech.when we weren't catching big fish), ate Peking duck (sliced head bones and all) in Beijing, toured light houses from the water in Maine, ate dinner with a moose, hugged a koala in Australia, got bit feeding a pelican on my dock in Florida, swam nose to nose with green turtles in Hawaii. stopped in awe to look at a lot of sites..wore a lei every day for 4 months, ate dim sum in China town, Honolulu, and drank a royal mai tai on Wakiki Beach every Sunday afternoon while we watched the surfers and beach goers. We will continue to stop long enough to smell the flowers along the way!

Janet in Egypt	Janet and Jerry at the Great Wall of China	“Begin Again”

After painting only one year I won my first local award (Dec. 2003) for a watercolor painting of a lionfish that I had photographed in the Coral Sea. The best advise I have been given was from my brother-in-law, Richard Dutton, former president of the Iowa Watercolor Society and retired art professor from Ottumwa, Iowa, who told me to come back and discuss my paintings with him after I had completed one hundred. Peggy McTeague from Wild Child Gallery in Matlacha, Fl. told me to get my paintings out in the world for people to see. Following their advice, I never had to discuss paintings with Richard, I just found myself winning awards in southwest Florida. In August 2005, I was awarded an Honorable Mention from WaterColor Magic Magazine, animal division for "A Shell Kinda Guy". I won the Daniel Smith award in the 2006 Southern Watercolor Annual Exhibit with a painting titled "Out of the Jar...M+M's" I have been accepted into four Florida Watercolor Society Exhibitions (2004, 2006,2007,2008)"Barefoot on the Beach","Rattle Me","Clockworks","Out of the Jar...Antique Buttons". I was honored with a first, "Missin Partners" and second place, "Rattle Me", in National Pen Women Florida's Exhibit 2005 and had one piece entered into their national exhibition in Denver, Co. 2006. One watercolor , "Rattle Me" of a SW rattlesnake was juried into the national exhibition in Punta Gorda Florida. From 2006 to date ( Aug, 2008) I have won over 55 awards in south west Florida. The first week of 2007, I was congratulated on my acceptance into the Transparent Watercolor Society Annual 2007 Exhibition, and notified that I had won the ARTISTS magazine's first place in their watercolor on-line contest to be published in the 2007 July/August issue with "Color a .Turtle". The same week I won first place at BIG gallery's annual themed show (Sanibel, Fl.) with " Kissimmee Stop". These were fantastic wins. They felt even better when the retired, wonderful person, Clare Candelori, who I had in 2005 encouraged to paint from her own photographs and mentored, had just been awarded 1st place in the newcomers division of Artists Magazine's Jan. 2007 issue. What a thrill that was for the both of us! When Artists Magazine called me, they asked where I got the inspiration for my paintings. In this case they were referring to the "Color a...Turtle!" watercolor that had just been awarded first place. The American Pen Women that I belong to has a member, Brenda Goodwin, who dresses up as a green crayola crayon to help inspire children to read and recite. All I could remember is how good it had felt to be a child receiving a gift box of crayola crayons for a special occasion and all the joy I felt in "coloring".  This prompted me to create "Color a ..Tiger", followed by "Color a .Turtle".  Then, I started to think about all the artistic things I did as a kid and all that inspired me to become an artist, educator, and now artist again..and those ideas continue to prompt continuous new ideas.  In the fall of 2008, my "Color a...Parrot" got accepted into the National Watercolor Exhibit, got an award and traveled throughout the United States for a year. I was also awarded a signature membership for that series. There just aren't enough hours or days in a week to contain the flood of ideas that I want to share through my paintings. As i continue my journey and career....go to Recognition and Awards, and the News-Events pages to get updated information on what i am currently doing.