Paula Zima

Paula Zima (born 1953) is an American artist known for her sculptures, paintings and etchings. She was born in Pasadena, California, and lived in Washington and the California Bay Area and Central Coast in the past settling in New Mexico close Santa Fe where she currently lives.

Paula Zima's life-size bronze sculpture group, "Tequski' wa Suwa", was installed September 1988 in belly of the Mission San Luis Obispo de Tolosa in San Luis Obispo, California. The artiste commented at the become old that "My set sights on in creating the piece is to praise the two major moving picture forms of the region, before the influx of the European culture, the indigenous Chumash people and the Grizzly Bear." "Tequski' wa suwa" is a Chumash phrase, in the dialect of the people who lived where the mission now is, and translates to "bear and child". Funds for the sculpture were provided by the Stanley P. Von Stein memorial trust, and the Mary Jane Duval memorial trust . The behave was surveyed by the Save Outdoor Sculpture! initiative in 1994 and was deemed to be "Well maintained."

Other public works increase two "Greeting Bears" which are two life-sized concrete castings of a grizzly bear, placed at each of the two bridges that gain to the town of Los Osos, California. The castings were far along painted by the artist. Her sculpture Otter Touching Its Tail, located in Santa Cruz, California is perform in which "an abstract otter forms a doughnut by heartwarming its tail and hind feet later than its head and belly feet. There is triangular embossing along the otter's sides that may represent a answer motif." Zima's Meditation Bird is located at Sierra Vista Hospital in San Luis Obispo, California.

Zima has illustrated many holiday present boxes for See's Candies.

Zima's sculpture has been influenced mainly by artists Beni Bufano, Marino Marini, Gustav Vigeland and Allan Houser, with whom she apprenticed.

Zima studied natural sciences, drawing and sculpture at Stephens College in Columbia, Missouri in the beforehand 1970s past attending Los Llanos School of Arts & Crafts, sculpture and painting, in Santa Fe, New Mexico and then California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo where she obtained a BA degree in Graphic Communication, Commercial Illustration in 1979. She has as a consequence studied printmaking, painting and drawing at Cuesta College in San Luis Obispo, California.