"Now my paintings have gone on a year-long world cruise. I hope they're having fun," says the seascape artist from Key Biscayne, Florida, who with her spouse, the Rev. Bob Libby, were preparing for a trip of their own on May 22 that will take them down Egypt's Nile River.

"It will mark 33 years of happy marriage and the 50th anniversary of my ordination," said the priest, who, before his retirement about 10 years ago, was rector at St. Christopher's Episcopal Church on Key Biscayne in the Diocese of Southeast Florida.

Well-known throughout Florida, South Carolina, Virginia and Michigan where she exhibited her work, Libby says she has changed her style from beach scenes that once included fences, trees and beach umbrellas. Now she accentuates purely sky and water in her pastels.

"This is what I see out my window, traveling across the causeway [to Miami], or swimming in the water with my nose to the horizon. This is huge material and it's my favorite," she says. "Now there are no trees, no grass, not even a bird. It has almost an abstract quality -- my friends like the term 'minimalist.' It can look quite contemporary even though it's a traditional subject."

She dismisses the idea she may run out of compositions soon. "Studying the water and the sky -- I find every two minutes it's different."

A sense of excitement runs through her pastel drawings, with subtle shades of yellow, pink and purple as sunrise hits the water, or voluminous clouds filter sunlight's rays on the tides, or ripples of water shimmer against the shore. "Bob and I have always lived on or near the beach. It's the thing I've loved the most. You've got be excited about it, love it and feel emotional about it in order for your art to be good."

In artist's studio
For the last 15 years, Libby has worked from an artist's studio in the Bakehouse Art Complex in the downtown area of Miami. Bakehouse, a non-profit complex started two decades ago by a group of artists, was named after the former bakery in the huge stone building that now boasts 70 artists' studios and two galleries. To the north is a fast-developing design district with its own studios and galleries and to the south many prestigious art galleries are moving in.

In his retirement, Bob Libby served as the interim dean at Miami's Trinity Cathedral and it was during and after that time that the couple became actively involved in its outreach program. "It has a strong outreach to the poor," says Lynne. "The main one is the 'breakfast feeding' three times a week when hundreds line up to get a breakfast packet and coffee made by volunteers. Six blocks from Bakehouse is a family homeless shelter that the cathedral supports."

She and her husband were instrumental in keeping the shelter from bankruptcy several years ago and she has since contributed artwork to the cathedral's fundraising project to support its outreach to the shelter which has rehabilitated 800 families over the years.

Several of Libby's paintings that remain on dry land can be viewed here (http://www.picturetrail.com/lynnelibby).