4 Wednesday, October 2, 2019 The Nugget Newspaper, Sisters, Oregon Oscar Peña’s work is on display at Sisters library By Helen Schmidling Correspondent As a youngster growing up in Mexico City, Oscar Peña loved to draw. He stud- ied art along with his other subjects, and his grandfather gave him a book about how to draw animals. He sketched a lot, but even if art was a pas- sion, it wasn9t destined to be his career. He set aside his sketchbook and went out for soccer. He opted to further his education at the Universidad Iberoamericana, graduating with a degree in electrical engineering. He worked for technology companies and lived in Mexico, Brazil, and the United States. When it came time to retire, Oscar and his wife, Gabriella, wanted to move to the mountains, after liv- ing in Florida for 15 years. Colorado didn9t feel quite right. They drove around the country, and 7,000 miles later, visited some friends that they knew from Florida who were living in Bend. Three months later, they moved to a new home in Sisters on December 31, 2016. Peña laughs now as he recalls that winter9s heavy snow. What it did was give him a chance to pick up a project that he9d begun some 45 years earlier 4 paint- ing and drawing. A series of Peña9s portraits and a land- scape are framed and on dis- play in the Computer Room of the Sisters Library through October 30. His first new drawings were with charcoal, as he rec- reated scenes from his cross- country travels. He found that people liked his work, and he began to get commis- sions from friends and neigh- bors. He dove into his work, experimenting with pastel, oil, watercolor, acrylic, and scratchboard. Since retirement, Peña has traveled to several countries, enjoying nature and getting to know the arts and cultures of different lands. He enjoys getting closer to nature and wildlife. On one such visit, he got very close to a mountain gorilla, and made a portrait he calls