Southwest Art’s 55th Anniversary | Shanna Kunz

NK: When did you become a professional artist?SK: I’ve done drawing my whole life. In school, I always took art classes, and I’ve done many other artistic things including sewing, flower arranging and interior decorating. But for my 29th birthday, I was given a watercolor class, and I fell head-over-heels in love with it. From that moment on, I knew painting was going to be my career. I took classes from other local artists and began selling my paintings at outdoor arts festivals and making a decent living at it. Then, starting in 1996 at the age of 33, I studied for three years in the art department at Utah State University in Logan, driving an hour each way from my home in the Ogden area.

NK: Has anything been a constant source of inspiration throughout your career?SK: My dad worked for the U.S. Forest Service, and we moved all over the country. All of our vacations were camping and fishing in the outdoors. The landscape was sacred to me. Once I started studying George Inness and the tonalist movement, I realized that a painting could say more than just what you see.

NK: How has your technique and style evolved over the years?SK: In making the change in college from watercolors, which are very thin and spontaneous, to oil paints, the surface quality of a painting became more and more important to me. I love playing with the surface and juxtaposing thin and thick, dark and light passages. I want the viewer to engage in the scene as much as I do in portraying it.

NK: What are some of your proudest career achievements?SK: Having my first article in Southwest Art in 2010 made me feel like what I was doing just might possibly be important to somebody else. That was a game-changer for me.

NK: What are you working on now?SK: For the first time, I’ve been invited to participate in the annual Roundup Exhibition & Sale at the Museum of Western Art in Kerrville, Texas. I’m really excited about that. As much as I love tonalism, I also love the Taos painters, especially E. Martin Hennings, and one of the pieces I’ve been working on for the show is an homage to a piece that Hennings did. It’s going to be different than my usual tonalist palette, with cottonwood leaves fully aflame with oranges and yellows and reds—and a couple little deer hidden in the trees.

contact informationshannakunz.com

representationIllume Gallery West, Phillipsburg, MT, illumegallerywest.comMockingbird Gallery, Bend, OR, mockingbird-gallery.com.Wild Horse Gallery, Steamboat Springs, CO, wildhorsegallery.com.Kneeland Gallery, Ketchum, ID, kneelandgallery.com.A Banks Gallery, Bozeman, MT, abanksgallery.com.Montgomery Lee Fine Art, Park City, UT, montgomeryleefineart.com.Turner Fine Art, Jackson, WY, turnerfineart.com.

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