Kathleen is a part time resident of Stone Harbor, NJ, who has previously lived in North Wildwood. She was born and raised in the Pocono Mountains of Pennsylvania and for the past Twenty years, had her primary residence with her husband, Mark and seven cats in Lancaster County.
She studied Fine Art at Kutztown University, earning a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Studio Art, where she fine tuned her skills in drawing and painting. Kathleen studied anatomy and particularly became involved in honing her ability to become a portrait artist, which she continues to this day.
Over the years, Kathleen has been involved in Art competitions, Juried shows, and enjoyed staying in the field she truly loved. She has taught Art in private schools as well as from her own home. The subject of her work could be described as “Surrealistic”, inspired by Salvador Dali and also influenced by the Impressionists. Her primary mediums of choice have been pen and ink, chalk pastel and in the earlier days, oil paint. When not painting the portrait, Kathleen prefers working from her imagination. This brought the concept of “surrealism”, dream imagery to the primary forefront. She studied the concepts behind Carl Jung’s Mandala’s, interested in the concept of using Art therapy to succeed in creating a therapeutic yet “pleasing” creation.
In recent years, she has been exploring Celtic Mythology and paranormal studies. This has opened Kathleen’s’ imagination to an entirely different world. She has found a “passion” in studying “elementals”.
Elementals, simply described; would be nature spirits that are non-human. In her paranormal research, she found a fascination with the communication of human entities, until one day that an elemental was encountered and she realized that there is far more out there that we do not understand. The elements, as we perceive them, are air, earth, fire and water. The corresponding elementals to these are Sylphs, Gnomes, Salamanders and Undines. Angels, Demons and faeries are part of this realm. Through her research she has found endless descriptions of these misunderstood beings. They vary in size from an atom to a UNIVERSE. She wonders if the Nebulas photographed from the Hubble telescope could be some form of “living” element?
Kathleen was actually fascinated with the unknown from a much younger age. Her interest and portrayal of such work in college was considered “trite” and “illustrative”. She shied away from this kind of work, to gain more notoriety and respect for her skills. Now, at this time in her life, she has thrown aside these concerns. After visiting the Brandywine museum and seeing the gorgeous work of the Wyeth family and Maxfield Parish, also known for illustrative yet beautiful creations. She opened up to the “Pre Raphaelite” work and threw aside the old concerns…
Kathleen released her creativity with a vengeance. In the past few months she began painting in acrylic. A medium she loathed in college, due to the fast drying time and distortion of the past masters techniques. She has reveled in the expediency of the process and has been working many hours in her studio as she overcomes the emotional turmoil of another job loss. Kathleen feels a burning desire to create all she can, as the inspiration has bubbled inside of her. Working on pieces from 5 x 7to 24 x 36 and a “triptych” that covers a wall of her bedroom.
She has been writing as well. Currently producing a biography, she is also working on a photographic journal about the Charles Evans Cemetery in Reading , PA. Having created a musical slideshow of her poetry and photography with a powerful musical background, this has been her therapy as a woman who has lost friends, family and children and learned to stand on her own two feet in the face of adversity. Thus, Turning tragedy into a beautiful accomplishment.