Jennifer Slouha

Jennifer Slouha

Jennifer Slouha is a self-taught artist living in Holts Summit, Missouri.  Her preferred mediums are professional grade colored pencils, graphite pencils and acrylic paint.  These media allow her to pursue a passion for realism and fine detail.  Her process involves the use of rich tonality and perspective.  Jennifer starts with researching the subject and begins forming the composition.  Then she creates a simple line drawing and begins building depth until the image takes form. Each colored pencil drawing requires from 30 to 100 hours to complete.

Jennifer enjoys creating highly technical pieces and continually works on improving her skills.  She specializes in commissioned photorealistic automotive artwork but also creates art in many other subjects such as pets, wildlife, cityscapes, and portraits

She is a member of the Columbia Art League in Columbia, Missouri and participates in the Community Exhibit Program, exhibiting her artwork throughout the city on a rotating basis.  She has also been accepted into Capital Arts Gallery in Jefferson City, Missouri, the Art House Gallery of Fulton, Missouri, and the Lake Fine Art Academy & Galleria in Osage Beach, Missouri for representation.  She was commissioned to create a series of automotive artwork for Missouri Auto Auction in Columbia, MO.  Her artwork has won awards and been published numerous times.  She has also been the sketch artist for an episode of the Travel Channel’s television series “The Dead Files”.

contact:
T: 573-397-3573
W:www.jenniferslouha.com

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Marcia Rackley

Marcia Rackley

Marcia Rackley earned a BFA degree in Illustration from the University of Missouri where she received the “Outstanding BFA Student Award” (Jerry Berneche Award) and won 2nd place in the MU Chancellor’s Art Competition. Marcia likes working in clay, pen and ink, watercolor, oil, acrylic, pastel, charcoal and photography.

She is a native Missourian and a registered Cherokee who has worked as a freelance artist for many years. Her commissions include: 12 illustrations for the University of Missouri Savitar (1987); paintings, photographs and two almanac covers for Shelter Insurance; private commissions; medical illustrations for liver research and patient education (University Hospital); and a mural (painted at the age of 16) featured in the Missourian. In 2001, Marcia exhibited her polymer hand-sculpted art dolls in the 2001 International Toy Fair in New York City as a member of a professional doll maker’s guild. In 2014, Marcia won 1st place ribbons at the Missouri State Fair for two of her pastel paintings and later won an award for her pastel painting Peppers and Goblets at the Boone County Art Show in Columbia.

Marcia also enjoys digital photography. She has been exhibiting her nature photographs for the last three years at Runge Nature Center (Jefferson City) and Powder Valley Nature Center (Kirkwood). She has also exhibited in the J. Lottes Health Sciences Library at the University of Missouri Hospital. In 2014, her photograph of the American Painted butterfly was selected by the National Federation of Wildlife for inclusion in their 2015 card collection.

Marcia currently works at her alma mater, the MU Department of Art, where she is inspired and amazed every day by its art students and faculty. She is a member of the Columbia Art League and her most recent soft pastel paintings will be on display at the Central Bank of Boone County, 720 E. Broadway, Columbia, Missouri, beginning November 23, 2015 and continuing through the month of December 2015.

The Nature of Things

Juvenile Bald Eagle

American Painted Lady

Peppers and Wine Glasses

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Hannah Hollister Ingmire

Hannah Hollister Ingmire

A stroke of luck started my art career when a kindergarten painting I did of an exhausted train climbing up a mountain was accepted in a traveling exhibit of Pennsylvania children’s art and hung in a Philadelphia art museum. After that, it was all downhill! Still, I loved making pictures and continued with private lessons until college. I graduated from Grinnell College with a B.F.A. in painting and did postgraduate work at the University of Iowa where I studied with Mauricio Lasansky, the printmaker. I also attended Quincy University where I got a teacher's degree in art and taguth at Quincy High School for two years. I have continued to teach adults throughout my career.

Again, I had a stroke of luck when I was invited to have an exhibit at the Quincy, Illinois Public Library, who then commissioned me to do a 25-foot mural. At this time, I went into painting full time. I have had several one-woman shows and spent the next 30 years doing juried art festivals. Midwestern shows include: the Original Art Fair (Ann Arbor, MI), The Plaza Art Festival (Kansas City, MO), The Milwaukee Art Museum Lakefront Show, and several in St. Louis. Florida shows include: Los Olas Art Festival, Winter Park, Coconut Grove, Miami Beach, the University of Miami Art Festival, and Mainsail (St. Petersburg). During this period, I also was asked by the Bradford Exchange, an international collector plate company, to design 2 series of plates.

For 40 years my medium was transparent watercolor, and my subject matter was traditional realism. My work can be found in businesses, hospitals, and banks, as well as private collections.

In 2009, I had another stroke of luck - but the kind that led to tremors which meant that I could no longer paint with my past precision. Since painting is literally as necessary to me as eating, I found another way to express myself. Having trained at Grinnell College in the sixties with a wonderful abstract expressionist, Richard Cervene, I turned to big canvases and big brushes. Now, instead of meticulously preplanning each work, I wade in with my instincts. The result has been very freeing for me. Although my tremors have subsided, I continue to paint in this manner because it makes me happy and, I hope, my viewers!

For a private viewing, please contact me below.

Galaxy

Feathery

Square

Birch Trees

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Diane Epstein

Diane Epstein

I have been a freelance graphic designer for more than thirty-six years throughout the Midwest. I have designed print materials for many fields including television, magazines, small business, educational programs, and the non-profit sector. I have been involved in all stages of the graphics process from design to final print.

Over the last few years I have been drawing/painting with pastels and watercolors, creating portraits of people and animals. My passion is drawing portraits for the parents of children who have either passed on or have a terminal illness. These are sent to the parents as a condolence gift.

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Marilyn Cummins

Marilyn Cummins

"In the depth of winter, I finally learned that there lay in me an invincible summer." – Albert Camus

I’ve loved to sketch and paint since I was a young girl on the farm, and I was fortunate to have a great art teacher (Mel Panter) in my small-town high school. But art was one of many interests, and not the one I pursued as a college major and career (ag journalism, in newspaper, magazine, PR/advertising agencies, and my own business for the past 26 years).  Still, the latent artist in me was always there: taking me into art museums on every business and vacation trip; collecting art supplies too rarely used; and, visiting galleries and meeting artists whose world my creative soul wanted to join. 

It wasn’t until I was in my late 40s and settled back in Columbia, that a magazine assignment to cover the local art community in word and photos led me to learn of the first painting workshop offered by an artist I greatly admired: Joel Sager. It was time to get serious about creating art, and with Joel’s encouragement, I followed up the 2007 summer workshops by studying with him nearly every week for close to five years, soaking up his expert guidance and being inspired by observing his process in the studio we shared for a time.

I began working in a favorite technique of Joel’s at the time: layering oils, acrylic, collage and tar washes in multimedia paintings, sometimes based on watercolor sketches inspired by my own photography of the land or of people. I needed to find my own voice, though, and in time, my rather minimalist landscape studies and other watercolor works began to stand on their own and became a trademark of mine. This still amazes me, after fearing and avoiding the medium for so many years.

As I continue to work and experiment with a variety of media – oil, watercolor, mixed-media in two and three dimensions, Chinese brush painting, photography – I strive to let go vs. trying to control the medium or create exact representations. When I’m successful, the invincible summer in me is able to find its voice and reach out to others in ways that are sometimes peaceful and serene; other times edgy and ironic.

For many years, I called Columbia’s Orr Street Studios home, but due to COVID-19 and other issues, I’ve moved back to my home studio with a peaceful view of my yard and woods. I encourage you to come visit Invincible Summer Studios virtually (for now), and also to pursue your own creative dreams, no matter your age or time in life. I believe there is an invincible summer in each of us.

Marilyn Cummins
Invincible Summer Studios

contact info:
Tel: 573-239-1229

www.invinciblesummerstudios.com

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Joel Chrisman

Joel Chrisman

As an artist and musician, my interest is in the study of patterns in light and sound. 

Observing the separation of light and shadow in a landscape, a window-lit room or from the lights of my studio as they shower my tools and workspaces, compels me to record those fragments in mostly realistic impressions. 

Whether working from my photographs or from life, my subjects are almost always happened upon, never assembled or constructed, although I may make decisions of omission and inclusion. The elements of chance and discovery are the primary contributing factors in these compositions. 

The moment of creation for me is in the visualization of a possibility, discovering that viewpoint in space where the dance of shapes and shadows falls into a rhythmic balance of light and dark. Then, with my camera or a simple mat board viewer, the image is isolated and I enter the dance and become a participant as I record the moment.

contact info:
T: 573-657-2055

Pond Series/Twilight

First Cutting

In the Ferris Wheel

Over Campus

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Vicki Downey Cheek

Vicki Downey Cheek

Being raised in rural Missouri on a farm outside Rocheport, much of Vicki’s artwork includes animals or nature in some fashion. She also enjoys creating different pieces of art from a variety of subjects. “I have a passion for horses and am drawn to the western way of life, but I also love discovering something hidden and unusual, and then showing it to the world thorough my art.” 

She finds most of the world to be extremely intriguing often hiding fascinating and mysterious parts of itself in plain sight to be overlooked by the mere passerby. These things frequently catch her eye and beg to be recreated in a piece of art. 

Working in a variety of mediums, it is graphite that she has a true passion for. “I feel as though I can merge with the piece as I am working on it when I use pencil. To me it is a more intimate way to be involved in the creation process than when I use a brush to paint.” 

Vicki has gathered references and researched subjects not only here in Missouri, but all over the United States. From the drover working in the Fort Worth Stockyards, to the door hinge found hiding along a deserted wharf in Savannah, GA, she is constantly looking for what inspires her. Then back in her studio, she works to depict each story in accuracy and in great detail. 

Vicki lives in Columbia, Missouri with her husband, two horses and two cats. Her paintings and drawings hang in private collections across the United States, in Taiwan, Australia, and England. She regularly donates to various charity events that benefit St. Jude's Children's Hospital, the American Cancer Society, and animal rescue organizations. 

A member of the Missouri Watercolor Society, Vicki received a Merchant Award in 2012 and 2013 at the Missouri Watercolor Society National Members’ Invitational exhibit in Columbia.

Contact:
T: 573-814-3168
W:downeyart.com/
and
vickicheek.wix.com/petportraits

Double Time

Saddle

Cardine Della Porta

The Last Goodbye

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