Haydée Lafaye Ellis is an artist and musician. Coming from a musical family of Spanish, French Creole, Cajun and Anglo-Saxon descent, Ellis was surrounded by music and musicians and began to study the piano at the age of 5. She was on stage in school musicals at the Academy of the Sacred Heart by the time she was eleven years old.

In addition to the piano, Ellis is a versatile musician who also sings and plays guitar and bass. She has performed professionally with several groups including, “Southern Comfort, The Haphazards” and “Haydée Lafaye and the Lafayettes.”

Ellis began painting in 1983. She studied with Alan Flattman and at the New Orleans Academy of Fine Arts with Dell Weller and Kathy Gergo. Her artistic endeavors have often revolved around her love of music, and she soon began her ongoing series of life-size oil paintings of musicians with whom she has worked, or are close friends including such icons as Fats Domino, Wynton Marsalis, the Neville Brothers and George Schmidt.

Her paintings have been shown in New Orleans, Covington, Slidell, Baton Rouge, Jennings and Lafayette, Louisiana as well as New York City, and are found in collections nationwide. In addition to her commissioned portraits, Ellis is also known for her landscapes. Many of the latter include moody cypress forests in Louisiana bayous.


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