Yerington Event: YTA Artist Reception for Karen Kreyeski, May 14, 2016

Yerington Event: YTA Artist Reception for Karen Kreyeski

May 14, 2016

Artist Karen Kreyeski

Attended an artist reception for Karen Kreyeski at the YTA on Saturday, May 14.  I got a chance to chat with the artist and view some of her work, which I really enjoyed.  She does lots of portraits and hopes to publish a book of her art some time in the future.  Below is a summary of her life in her own words taken from her website:  http://karenkreyeski.com/

Karen Kreyeski Self-Portrait

Originally from Montana where I worked in fiber, I designed my own fabric through batik and tie dye, designing clothing and large tapestries on silk and linen. However when I moved to Nevada, I was drawn to paint the stark landscape and the mountain ranges using watercolors, oils, and mixed media. I love their naked human-like forms in this high desert of the Great Basin.  I was not inclined to paint what is but to reorganize the natural reality into my idea of a dreamscape. I like to play with the elements of time and space while giving a sense of the place that has so moved me.

My most treasured art adventure was a summer working and living in Yellowstone Park at the Caldera Art Center via a Thomas Moran Fellowship. Those artists with whom I have worked post grad that have most influenced my ideology and technique are Bailey Doogan and Francheskaa in Arizona, Joellyn Duesberry in Colorado, Jean LaGassick in Nevada, and Sant Sabaugh Khalsa, Phyllis Schafer, and Gregory Kondos in California

. (I think this was one of my favorites. I love the expressions on this lady's face - so much personality)

My professional training was acquired at Eastern Montana University and the Memphis Art Academy. I worked for 30 plus years in art education, simultaneously following my passion for painting. In the mid 80’s I initiated the Northern Nevada Art Educators, was an active officer regionally and statewide for 5 years, received an Outstanding Nevada Art Educator Award and represented Nevada in a national invitational Master Art Teacher Seminar in Johnson, Vermont.  Active in town art councils, I coordinated artist-in-residence programs through the Nevada State Council on the Arts throughout my teaching career, which also enriched and broadened my artistic outlook.

I’ve exhibited my work in the University of Nevada, Reno, and other collegian, art agency, and professional galleries in Nevada, California and Colorado. My most recent juried one person exhibit at the Western Colorado Center for the Arts contained over 50 pieces of work about the journey from Western Nevada to Western Colorado over a 30 year period of time.

 

  

Retired from teaching but still painting, I live with my husband and near my family on top of a mountain in Northern Nevada where nature’s bounty of mountainscapes is an ever-changing vista.