“When I was little, I had no doubt in my mind that I was just an artist. I didn’t doubt that one bit.”

From a little girl in grade school, more interested in art than her other subjects, to a grown woman now living southeast of Oskaloosa, Pamela Pantuso has finally found her muse.

“I know I got in trouble a lot in first-grade because I was coloring instead of doing my math,” Pantuso said of her life-long passion to be an artist. “I got in trouble every time my parents went to conferences. I knew I was going to get in trouble because I was coloring instead of doing my homework.”

Pantuso said she started with crayons, went to watercolors and now uses oils, pastels, colored pencils, acrylics, an airbrush, and even her fingers, to create her artwork.

“Even with my oil paintings, I use my fingers a lot,” Pantuso said. “I still finger paint. I like to almost feel my paintings. I feel like I’m more involved in the painting.”

The 39-year-old Colorado native said she has been painting all her life and professionally for the last 10 years. She moved to Iowa five years ago and has lived on Queens Avenue off Highway 23 the last two years.

Pantuso said she paints portraits, leather paintings, and scenery, wildlife and fantasy paintings.

“I love portraits,” Pantuso said. “I’m fascinated with people’s expressions — it’s like a story. You can look at somebody’s face and you can see a story there.”

One of her latest endeavors has been that of a famous Native American and Mahaska County icon.

With not much visual reference to work with, Pantuso has created an oil and acrylic painting of Chief Mahaska, a famous Native American for which this county is named. Pantuso created the painting using reference work from the famous frontier artist, George Catlin, and various other sources.

“There is very little to go on visually. However, some of the written documentation has filled in the gaps for me as best as possible,” Pantuso said. “I get the feeling that Catlin’s painting was the best reference as he did his paintings in person, and was not tied to any political agenda. He also seems to share my sentiments toward the people he painted.”

Pantuso’s rendition of the chief of the Ioway Indians shows the man in his 40s, at a time in his life where he had lost his wife and father. It measures 19 1/2 inches by 29 inches, is oil and a little bit of acrylic on canvas and took Pantuso 30 hours to paint.

“What I wanted to get with him was the fact that he had all these hard times and that shows in his face,” Pantuso said. “But yet I wanted to still to have gentleness about him. Because that was what he was about. He was a peace lover.”

Pantuso said she picked Chief Mahaska to paint, based in part, on her respect and admiration of the man and his people.

“Native American history kind of fascinates me. And I started reading about his life and his belief system is a lot like mine. And as a people, I think they haven’t been portrayed in the way that it actually was,” Pantuso said. “And I wanted to give some honor to how he really looked, what he was really about.”