Virginia Hein is an artist, author, and art instructor from Los Angeles, California, who has recently moved to the Pacific Northwest. She is currently discovering the beauties of her new home with, as always, a sketchbook!

She counts herself lucky to have worked as an artist in one form or another throughout her life—as designer, art director, illustrator and teacher. She taught at Otis College of Art and Design in Los Angeles for 13 years, and now teaches sketching workshops locally and internationally. She taught “Sketching on Location” workshops at Descanso Gardens Los Angeles County Botanical Garden for 12 years, and was honored by Descanso in 2024 with an exhibition of her sketchbook work.

Virginia is a member of the international community of Urban Sketchers, and has been honored to teach workshops at 5 international Urban Sketchers Symposiums. She has contributed her work to a number of books about location sketching. Her book “5 Minute Sketching Landscapes”, was published by RotoVision, in 2017, and she co-authored “The Urban Sketching Handbook Spotlight on Nature”, Quarry Books, 2022, with Gail L.
Wong. Virginia received an MFA in Drawing and Painting from California State University, Long Beach, where she also taught Watercolor Painting.

Virginia considers drawing to be her first language, and continues to find
drawing a path of discovery and joy. You can see her work on Instagram,
@virginiahein, and on her website, vheinstudio.com.