kidart, incorporated ~ a collaboration

While visiting friends in early 2010, I was captivated by a self-portrait their seven-year-old daughter had created: a small, white, paper cut-out with simple, striking features drawn on with a pen. Visually, it was a marvel, and a fragile one that needed preserving.

I'd been working in acrylics for about ten years by then, and I'd occasionally incorporated "found" items such as newsprint, handwritten notes, and other pictures onto the canvas. So when I came across Meredith's utterly charming self-portrait, I immediately thought of collage. The young artist graciously allowed me to have the piece. (After, of course, I said "Please and thank you.")

In the process of working Meredith's original onto my canvas, I got the idea that I was being let in on a secret. Every dot and line of Meredith’s artwork was like a map leading to the treasures of a child’s imagination – and freeing my own. I was intrigued by that experience, so I asked Meredith’s four-year-old brother, Phillip, to create his own drawing for a collaboration with "Miss Suzi." The finished works were enthusiastically received by both kids and parents, and thus was born the idea of kidart, incorporated.

If you would like to know more about kidart, incorporated or want to have your child’s work preserved in this unique way, please contact me.