Kathy O'Leary
International Plein Air Painters, Associate
Visit her website at https://www.kathyoleary.com
Kathy O'Leary Bio
Bio
Kathy O’Leary is a contemporary realist painter residing in Eureka on California’s far north coast. Like many artists her interest in drawing, painting and designing began early in life and continued up through her college years when she began majoring in “commercial art” in order to make a living with her work. However, she became disenchanted with the commercial aspects of art and left the field, directing her efforts toward other studies, work and raising a family. During the hiatus from the practice of doing art she maintained an interest and connection to fine art, through galleries, museums, books, and collecting original art for her home.
In the early 90’s she returned again to producing
her own art and has been working at it full time ever since. Her basic
training in commercial art and illustration provided a solid grounding
as she explored and experimented with different mediums, finally
settling on oils to express the beauty of the natural world she was so
drawn to paint. Long hours on the job and living in a rural artist’s
colony provided her with many artistic resources with which to quickly
learn and practice the skills needed to become a professional in her
field. She gained further experience and knowledge working with several
accomplished artists and attending workshops including workshops through
Plein Air Painters of America and studying with Scott Christensen,
Carolyn Anderson, Mark Kerckhoff, and Jim McVicker.
Today, Kathy
works exclusively as an oil painter. She works both en plein air, when
weather and circumstances permit, and on larger format paintings in her
studio from field sketches and her digital photography. The main focus
of her work is the California landscape. Over the years she has
traveled to many regions around the state for landscape subject matter.
Her trips have included several weeks painting in Yosemite with other
painters from her north coast region, painting at several regional land
trusts with the California Art Club (including Southern Sierra Foothills
Land Trust, San Luis Obispo, and the Tejon Ranch), painting in the High
Sierra Lakes area, and painting in several desert regions, including
Joshua Tree, Cochella and Anza Borrego.
As a California native, she has always been drawn to paint landscape subject matter that included oak trees. A Couple of years ago, upon learning about the value of the state's oaks to healthy land, water, and animal populations, and about the ever increasing threat, due to disease, development and fire, Kathy has begun focusing exclusively on these important and iconic trees. While she continues to travel, paint and photograph, developing material for her paintings, her focus is California's oaks. Part of her efforts include learning about the trees, their varieties and habitats, their value to native people's for thousands of years, and the location of various oak regions to find material. This quest has also lead the artist to create a blog (California Oak Trails - A painter's Journey) highlighting her path and her discoveries about these iconic California trees.
Kathy’s work has won recognition and awards
in regional and national juried exhibitions. Over the years her work
has been carried by several brick and motor galleries in including
most recently, the Elliott Fouts Gallery, Sacramento, The Studio Shop
Gallery, Burlingame, and Strawberry Rock Gallery, Trinidad and Sewell
Gallery, Eureka, CA.
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Congrats @ Kathy O'Leary !
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