Fine Art
Katharine L. McKenna:
Award-Winning Painter
Award-Winning Painter
"My goal is to create indelible images that are uniquely individual, each with their own identity, personality and purpose,
while at the same time exhibit a recognizable voice." ~ K.L. McKenna
while at the same time exhibit a recognizable voice." ~ K.L. McKenna
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Lake at Silver Spruce Ranch (CO)
Oil on Linen - 36 X 54
© Katharine L. McKenna
Oil on Linen - 36 X 54
© Katharine L. McKenna
Katharine's inspiration is rooted in childhood experiences with her paleontologist father whose expeditions exposed her to the American west, a territory that represents to her the concept of wide open spaces, dirt roads and the last frontier. Her adventures, from early childhood, began in the secret turrets of the Museum of Natural History where her father held the most prominent position as curator of vertebrates for forty years. Like Alice in Wonderland, she slipped through a hidden door to a world few are privileged to know, and when he explored the world, so did she, returning with fossils and tales of the wildernesses and deserts.
Her luminous landscape paintings reveal a profound attachment to the natural geology and essence of place in her paintings of Wyoming, Colorado, Montana, Utah and Arizona. Monumental rock formations meet flat plains; angular roads eerily cut through landscapes seemingly uninhabited; endless sky and natural geometries dominate. McKenna's influences are evident; Gauguin and van Gogh in color and line; Bonnard in flattened pattern; and Georgia O'Keeffe in the skillful fusion between the abstract and the figurative.
Her luminous landscape paintings reveal a profound attachment to the natural geology and essence of place in her paintings of Wyoming, Colorado, Montana, Utah and Arizona. Monumental rock formations meet flat plains; angular roads eerily cut through landscapes seemingly uninhabited; endless sky and natural geometries dominate. McKenna's influences are evident; Gauguin and van Gogh in color and line; Bonnard in flattened pattern; and Georgia O'Keeffe in the skillful fusion between the abstract and the figurative.
Dancing Grasses
Oil on Linen - 36 X 40 © Katharine L. McKenna |
Partial Artist Statement: "The energy that flows through my hands and onto the canvas is something that I describe as my Color, Light and Spirit technique, which has become my signature. My lifeʼs work is to illuminate the mind in an exciting new way - not to defy tradition, but to expand assumption." ~ Katharine L. McKenna |
Born in Berkeley, California and a long-time resident of Woodstock, NY, Katharine L. McKenna divides her time between the Hudson Valley and the American West.
Museum exhibitions include the Rockwell Museum of Western Art, the Booth Western Art Museum, the Yellowstone Art Museum, the Buffalo Bill Center of the West, the Museum of Northern Arizona and the Desert Caballeros Museum. She exhibited with the State Department's Art in Embassies Program in Burkina Faso, West Africa as well as at the Rubin Museum, NY, National Arts Club, NY and the Clayton Center for the Arts, Maryville, TN. Katharine's paintings happily reside in permanent collections of the Rockwell Museum, the Museum of Northern Arizona, the Booth Museum, the Woodstock Artists Association & Museum and at the Desert Caballeros Museum in Wickenburg, AZ.
Katharine won the People's Choice Award 2015 at Cowgirl Up! Exhibition at the Desert Caballeros Western Museum. K. L. McKenna’s painting, “Ranch Cattleguard” was featured on the cover of Southwest Art Magazine, August, 2018. Her most recent exhibition was at the Lakewood Center for the Arts, in Lakewood, CO.
Museum exhibitions include the Rockwell Museum of Western Art, the Booth Western Art Museum, the Yellowstone Art Museum, the Buffalo Bill Center of the West, the Museum of Northern Arizona and the Desert Caballeros Museum. She exhibited with the State Department's Art in Embassies Program in Burkina Faso, West Africa as well as at the Rubin Museum, NY, National Arts Club, NY and the Clayton Center for the Arts, Maryville, TN. Katharine's paintings happily reside in permanent collections of the Rockwell Museum, the Museum of Northern Arizona, the Booth Museum, the Woodstock Artists Association & Museum and at the Desert Caballeros Museum in Wickenburg, AZ.
Katharine won the People's Choice Award 2015 at Cowgirl Up! Exhibition at the Desert Caballeros Western Museum. K. L. McKenna’s painting, “Ranch Cattleguard” was featured on the cover of Southwest Art Magazine, August, 2018. Her most recent exhibition was at the Lakewood Center for the Arts, in Lakewood, CO.
Click image above for book excerpt.
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