About the Artist

   Karen Miller was born in Sacramento CA in 1955, and has lived in the northern part of the state nearly all her life. The exception was the short time she lived on California’s Central Coast, where a paucity of trees prompted her hasty return to the north. She studied Fine Art at UC Santa Cruz in her youth (doing lithography and intaglio in black and white), became a Structural Engineer for twenty years, battled a serious illness for a decade and then came full-circle back to life as an artist.

Painting in soft pastels since 2014, she has had her work in local shows and juried exhibitions since 2017. While her earlier pastels focused on landscapes from her travels in the West and Southwest, more current work encompasses local landscapes, the occasional still life,  tree portraits and vignettes of both interior scenes and in nature. She works both in the studio and en Plein air. 

 She lives in Healdsburg, California : a small town in the wine country, surrounded by vineyards and oak studded Coast Ranges and the meandering Russian River. She has a Redwood tree out her back window.

Karen works on a variety of archival sanded papers (current favorite is UART) with a range of pastels: Rembrandts, Great America, Girault, Unison, Richeson, Sennelier, Townsend and Terry Ludwig and has designs on a few more brands because one can never have too many pastels.

Juried Exhibitions

International Association do Pastel Societies, “38th Open division Juried Exhibition, Chicago IL 2021

Pastel Society of the West Coast, "Pastels USA 2018" (also 2017, 2019 and 2022) https://issuu.com/pswcnewsletter/docs/pswc_magazine_summer_2018

Pastel Society of North Carolina, "Pure Color 2018"  https://www.onlinejuriedshows.com/ClosedShowThumbs.aspx?OJSID=24002

SierraPastel Society, "Sierra  on High 2018"http://sierrapastelsociety.net/shows

Pastel Society of the West Coast, "Member Show 2018" (also 2019, 2021 and 2022) https://www.pswc.ws/docs/PSWC%20Online%20Member%20Show%202018%20Accepted%20Works.pdf

Graton Gallery: "Anything Goes 2018" (Honorable Mention), Graton CA

Graton Gallery: "Small Works 2018", Graton CA

Other Exhibitions

Upstairs Art Gallery: “Close to Home” Small Works Showcase, June 2022

                                       ”Brighter Days” Small Works Showcase, May 2021

                                       ”Composed for Solace” Featured Artist September 2020

                                       ”Quiet Places: Sonoma County in Pastels” Featured Artist October 2019

                                       "Drawn to Water" featured artist along with member artists Andrea Cleall and Beverly Bird, 2019

Chroma Gallery/ Santa Rosa Arts Center http://chromagallery.net/landscape-and-memories/

Red Shoes Gallery: "Red Rocks, Green Trees" with artist Shonnie Brown 2017, Santa Rosa CA

Healdsburg Center for the Arts: Member Show, 2018, Healdsburg CA

City of Healdsburg Bistro Gallery: "Healdsburg Gems" with artist Shonnie Brown, 2017, Healdsburg CA

Glaser Center: "Delicacy and Drama" with artist Shonnie Brown, 2017, Santa Rosa CA

Articles:

https://www.pressdemocrat.com/news/6938333-181/healdsburg-art-buddies-a-study