Rochelle Bayless received her formal artistic training through the Foundation Program at Maine College of Art (formerly Portland School of Art), where she initially studied photography, before earning a BFA in Painting and Printmaking from Lyme Academy College of Fine Art. Her undergraduate studies emphasized representational and figurative fine art, with rigorous training in drawing, painting, sculpture, and classical color theory.

Following her studio education, Bayless pursued graduate studies at Hartford International University for Religion & Peace (formerly Hartford Seminary), earning an MA in Theology. Her academic work focused on feminist theology, chaplaincy, and interfaith peacebuilding. Alongside her ongoing work as a professional chaplain, this training continues to shape her understanding of presence, seeing, witnessing, and the ethical dimensions of attention.

Bayless’s current artistic practice is rooted in Zen Buddhism and contemplative discipline, particularly the Ensō tradition of circle drawing. Her ongoing body of work, Meditations in Color, explores circles of pure pigment as sites of stillness, repetition, and return. These works function as visual meditations, engaging themes of impermanence, emptiness, unity, and duration, while foregrounding the physical intelligence of color, breath, and gesture.

Working across painting, drawing, photography, and process-based media, Bayless understands artmaking as a practice of attention rather than expression. Her work reflects a sustained inquiry into how disciplined craftsmanship, contemplative practice, and lived experience converge, creating spaces for quiet encounter rather than narrative resolution.

She is influenced by artists including Jenny Saville, Édouard Vuillard, Mark Rothko, and Barbara Kruger, as well as by the teachings of Thich Nhat Hanh. Bayless studied with painter Henry Finkelstein and master draftsman Dean Keller, whose emphasis on craft, discipline, and seeing continues to inform her work.