Rhonda Gates is a contemporary visual artist whose abstract paintings investigate the dynamic exchange between elemental forces: the energy that moves between land and sky, between storm and earth, between the geological and the living. Her work approaches landscape not as terrain or image, but as a restless system of actors: storm clouds, fog, rain, oak trees, hay bales, rocks, migrating birds, each with agency, each transformed by the forces that shape and mark them.

Based in the Midwest, Gates draws from direct experience across Michigan, Missouri, and Illinois: restless landscapes of prairies and woodlands, rolling hills and rock outcroppings, flat flood plains and open sky, always on the verge of becoming something else. Working in acrylic and oil with graphite on panel, she builds layered surfaces through accumulation: luminous acrylic washes beneath thick impasto oil geometry, each material leaving its mark on what came before. Geometric shapes anchor the surface, holding atmospheric force and the pressing weight of sky, while the washes glow beneath them: smooth, boundless, and alive with nuanced color. An avid fossil hunter who travels annually to England's Jurassic Coast, Gates approaches landscape with the sustained attention of someone who reads it not only for what it looks like, but for the energy it generates.

Gates holds a BFA in Fine Art and an MSEd in Art Education. Her work has been exhibited nationally, featured in Art in America, Artnet, and the Chicago Tribune, and is held in museum collections. Recent highlights include inclusion in the 2025 Midwest edition of New American Paintings and the Rockford Art Museum's 78th Rockford Midwest Biennial.