Featured Artist - Kim Collister

I'm a little overdue to have a Featured Artist, although I'm betting you'll find this unique and special artist worth the wait. I am featuring Kim Collister this month, she's a personal friend who I was privileged to meet over at Inspiration Avenue's blog when I was a member there. I find her multi-media collagist, dimensional art so intriguing and inspiring. Her pieces always make me feel joyful and like I want to go jump into a new art project so I can play with color. Her art reminds me to nurture that childlike wonder that fuels my love of color. I'm in love with her pieces and I know you'll fall in love with them too.

Kim is such a joyful and exuberant human being who inspires all around her to see the positive side of life. Every time I hear from her I'm buoyed in spirit. There's something about her aura that imbues everything she touches and I'm so happy to call her a friend. Here's the lively interview I did with her several months ago.

ACEO on sale in Kim's Etsy Shop

Jenn: How did you get started making art?

Kim: When I was a young child I remember always making something out of nothing. I am pretty sure my artistic abilities came from my dad. He had another profession, but I remember sitting at the table with him watching him draw. People were always asking him to do something, he was very talented artistically and design wise. I followed in his footsteps growing up. Creating art was my way of contributing through school, for friends and family and just enjoying my creative abilities. I did not really start making art and pursuing it for myself until my husband became ill in 2000. It was then that I needed a creative outlet and I began making ACEO cards, and started selling on Ebay. In 2009 my son and daughter began telling me about ETSY. It was in November of that year that I opened my shop IMGIRL.

Art Mailing Label:
"Chase Your Dreams"

Art Mailing Label:
"Laugh"

Art Mailing Label:
"Breathe & Let Go"

Jenn: Do you sell your work, where?

Kim: Before my ETSY shop, I started selling art greeting cards in a couple artsy boutiques about an hour from where I live. After my ETSY shop opened, I branched out selling my art creations to a shop locally and one in Maine. I also sell through private commissions, craft art fairs when time permits and charity fund raisers. And of course, I sell through my shop IMGIRL on ETSY.

Front of tri-fold
pocket envelope

Inner fold

open tri-fold pocket envelope

Jenn: What is your process in creation? (do you like plein air best or use of a photograph, or your own imagination, or follow where the art supplies take you?)

Kim: LOL, there is no process to my creations. It is strictly my vivid imagination. I definitely follow where my art supplies take me. My process if you call it that begins with collecting supplies. My eye is always looking and dissecting images and my brain is processing what I can do with them. I do a lot of collage work, which I love, so photos, pictures and any paper items always catch my eye. For me, part of the joy of creating is in gathering my supplies. I love to have a menagerie of supplies in front of me when I begin. So for me, the story and creative process really begins with lots of supplies and some quiet moments when I can get them. I love not knowing where I will begin or where it will end.

Jenn: What are your favorite artist's supplies?

Kim: When I can’t find something I really need or there is just no substitute, I can always depend on “Blick Art Supplies” (Links in my sidebar!) and I just order it. Things I have ordered that I love and always have on hand are: Tim Holtz alcohol inks, Washi tape, Gesso, Copic markers, Neocolor II crayons, Faber-Castill Pitt art pens, glitter glue, and paint pens. Always a black and a white paint pen.

But most of the time, I use cheap acrylics and supplies I find at local craft stores like Michaels or Hobby Lobby. I love finding ways to use what I have available to me. Rather than throwing out, for instance, the cardboard pad that the frozen pizza sits on, I have used the cardboard for my art creations in postcards and tags. The plastic frozen food entrée containers make excellent containers to mix paint.

(This piece below is my absolute favorite, it's so expressive and just inspires me so 

much to continue to be an artist. Kim is such an amazingly talented person!)

Old Fashioned Paint Box Collage Art Piece

Jenn: How does making a spectacular piece make you feel?

Kim: I always surprise myself when I make anything. I have no formal art training and I just let my imagination and my heart work through my hands and guide me. When my creation is finished, I am like a little kid going “Look what I did”. I am most definitely the best fan of my own work. I always try to do what I love, so I am almost always happy with it. If it doesn’t sell, then I'm pretty satisfied with seeing it in my studio and looking at it myself. When I make something I love, it just keeps a smile on my face. When someone else loves it too? Well, it just doesn’t get any better than that.

Handmade Altered Art Journal

Inside Front Cover of Altered Art Journal

Vintage Steampunk
Skeleton Key Necklace

Jenn: What do you do with a less than steller piece, do you rework until you're happy?

Kim: This is a hard question. On many occasions, I have started down a path with a piece and then wondered where I was going with it? I can almost always re-work it. I am almost always happy with my work. I prefer the beauty of imperfection rather than a perfected piece. I'm not sure if that is ignorance or just the signature of an artist. The works of any artist is certain to not to please everyone or even to be understood by everyone. I mean, look at Picasso, what was he thinking when he got up some days? As long as the piece is something I am pleased with, then it's steller to me and a signature of my art. Maybe one day, someone will be trying to figure out what the heck I was thinking!

Jenn: Is there anything else you'd like me to include about you or your art? (anything you'd like to elaborate on would be greatly helpful!)

Kim: Art has been such a process in my life. It has opened up so many avenues for me and has just made me look at the world around me and people more in depth, not just surface quality. I am more grateful, for everything. I have always been an incorrigible optimist, I always think I can. I have met so many strong incredible women and artists through my blog, just like yourself, (awww, thank you Kim!!) and I always learn something from each one of them. IMGIRL without wings… that's me. I have learned that if you try instead of waiting for things to happen, you will find that the things you think you can do, ...you actually can can. The things you can’t do, you learn from, and the places you can go are only up to you. Thank you Jenn, it has really been an honor for me to be a featured artist on your blog!

Hand-sewn Altered Art Journal

Also comes with book tags!

Kim, it was an honor interviewing you and peeking a little behind the "curtain". Thanks for being so honest and giving us new ways of seeing the world. I really enjoyed seeing your art and learning how you make such unique and beautiful pieces. I'm sure both collage and non-collage artists alike will find your process and art so interesting and intriguing. It's been such a pleasure knowing you.

Kim's Links:

• Kim's artwork is featured in the current issue (Sept/Oct 2012) of Somerset Studio and also Somerset Life. So cool Kim!!
• Blog: IMGIRL Without Wings
• Artwork: Living The Color-Filled Life
• Etsy Shop: IMGIRL
• Follow her on Bloglovin'
• Follow her on Pinterest

Best,

If you're looking for this week's APR, just click here, scroll down to the bottom to add your artwork! Issue 2 of FEATURING magazine is now being mailed out so check your mailboxes next week and enjoy the new issue!! (purchase your copy here and be entered into a giveaway for one of five new Art Journaling Books.)

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