Rising Star?

Why does Kathleen Zimmerman think that zebras are Rising Stars?

Kathleen Zimmerman’s latest drawing, Rising Star, is the fourth in her Star Series. The idea behind this series is to portray a variety of animals that have for some reason or another grabbed our attention and become stars, in a sense. Stars, in that they have become icons that are used widely in stories and popular culture.

Star Series - Rising, drawing, created and copyrighted by Kathleen Zimmerman

Star Series - Rising, drawing, created and copyrighted by Kathleen Zimmerman

Zebras have long been featured in African folktales but in recent times have found themselves front and center in American popular culture. Most notably in films such as, Madagascar, Racing Stripes and Khumba. This is why Zimmerman sees them as rising stars. She believes these iconic animals are featured in popular culture due to their inherent design and sociability. The fact that they exhibit the ultimate mastery of design, both in their coats and their form, is one reason. It is hard to imagine a more distinctive and pleasing coloration. Each zebra has its own unique patterning much like each human has its own unique fingerprint. Their physical form is strong and fleet. Their sharp hooves and muscular build are used to ward off predators who get close but its their ability to run full out in large groups that captures our imagination.  The other reason they have become “stars”, their social nature. They choose to live in groups, from small family-sized groups to large-scale herds, bonding to whatever group they find themselves in. When they are not being threatened, they live quite peacefully helping each other by loosening matted hair with their teeth or fanning flies away from their herd mates with their tails as they graze the grasslands or mountainsides. These aspects endear them to us. So, when thinking about the Stars of the animal world, it is no wonder Kathleen Zimmerman chose them for inclusion.

For those who have not seen our related post concerning Kathleen Zimmerman’s Star Series, we are sharing images of her first two serigraphs from that series, Evening Star and Morning Star. These intense portraits of the wild versions of the cat and the dog, or tiger and wolf, integrate the aesthetic beauty of these animals with hints of their jungle and forest habitats. While these carnivores have long been feared and even hated because they were seen as rivals to humans, this is changing in today’s world as it should be. They are no longer our rivals but worthy fellow creatures that deserve our respect and allowed the space they need to live their lives. They are after all, essential members of healthy wild ecosystems. When left alone in the wild, they create a balance that is beneficial to both the plant and animals’ worlds. In Zimmerman’s serigraphs, she used orange in reference to the evening sky and the tiger’s coat while she used blue in reference to the early morning sky and the wolf’s melancholy song.

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An image of Zimmerman’s third serigraph in this series, Star Series - Midday is shown above. Here Zimmerman portrayed the iconic Panda Bear, an undeniable star of the animal world. This masked sweetheart has a way of stealing everyone’s hearts away largely due to its distinctive coloration, gentle nature and clumsy yet adorable way of moving. In Zimmerman’s serigraph, she used green to reference its bamboo forest habitat and its harmonious, optimistic personality.

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While the limited-edition, hand-pulled serigraphic prints of Star Series - Rising have not been created yet, the image above shows its design.  Along with the depiction of a zebra, hints of its savanna and mountainside complete this composition. Zimmerman plans to use a golden background to symbolize the rising sun, grasslands and enlightenment that is needed to protect them from endangerment and extinction.

Kathleen Zimmerman’s digital print edition is now available, but we will let you know when the serigraphic prints become available on this website and through our emailing list. If you are not on our email list, go to the contact page on this website and sign up to get periodic emails about Kathleen Zimmerman’s latest creations!

Zimmerman Fine Art Studio

Intimate Is In!

Kathleen Zimmerman’s intimate-scale prints are now available for adoption on our website!

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We at Zimmerman Fine Art Studio are proud to announce that we are opening an e-commerce page on this website to make it easy to collect Kathleen Zimmerman’s digital prints! This page can be found by going to digital prints listed in the menu items.

Zimmerman created her collection of limited-edition digital prints from her original drawings. She scanned each drawing into her computer to create a digital file. Then she refined and altered each image to make them a distinct work of art. While these prints capture the essence of the original drawings, the media and the manipulations make them unique. Zimmerman then personally printed each one using archival ink nestled comfortably on 8 x 10 sheets of fine art paper. This ensured that each print is of the highest quality and the perfect size to fit any living space. The small scale draws the viewer in, giving them an intimate experience with the work. It also allows the patron to create a meaningful presence in a small space by hanging just one or for a larger space by grouping two or more together!

Kathleen Zimmerman limited the editions to 100 and kept the pricing consistent. This was done in order to ensure the quality of each print and to make the patron’s choice about personal connection. The only exception is a slight discount for prints that are only sold as a pair, such as: Global Series - Bear Hugs, Instrument Series - Fe Male, Journey Series - Hi Lo, Offspring Series - Motherhood and Fatherhood, Rights Series - Balanced and Unbalanced, WoMan Series - Man and Wo, and her Star Series - Evening and Morning (shown below in that order).

For patrons who would like to support the environment as well as acquire a meaningful work of art, there is another option. A limited selection of both her serigraphic and digital prints can be adopted with ease from the Artists for Conservation’s website. We donate 25% of the value of the artwork to worthy environment groups such as, the World Wildlife Fund, The Nature Conservancy or Compassion for World Farming. The link to her webpages on Artists for Conservation’s website is http://www.artistsforconservation.org/Kathleen-Zimmerman.

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We hope these online galleries will make it possible for everyone to add meaningful art to their living space!

Zimmerman Fine Art Studio

Community Spirit

What do sheep and lambs symbolize to me?

Why are they one of animals that have wandered into my artwork for years?

My latest sculptures shown above, Community Spirit Meeting and Community Spirit Siblings, made me think about why sheep or lambs have repeatedly appeared in my artwork. It is in-part because they symbolize innocence, compassion, and the desire to belong. I see sheep’s gentle nature and desire to be a part of a community as positive traits. To be kind and giving may be seen as weaknesses to the ‘dog eat dog’ crowd, but I disagree. Gentleness and kindness are traits that can’t be emulated enough among people throughtout the world. These qualities help foster the sense of community that people desperately want; a quality that sheep have in abundance. It takes strength to stand together as a community, regardless of adversity. Another reason I repeatedly use sheep in my artwork is due to their sheer aesthetic beauty. They are blessed with a luscious coat, bobbing tail and sweet face. How could you not fall in love with these creatures and want to create works of art with their essence? 

Above and below are two images of Counting Sheep, another sculpture I recently created. It is a grown-up version of Community Spirit in size and attitude. Both of these sculptures can be enjoyed alone, in groups or intermixed to express and explore different ideas concerning group dynamics. 

I don’t only use sheep in my sculpture or just recently. It is often found in digital prints, serigraphic prints and early sculpture. Some examples are shown below in order from top to bottom: YinYang Series - Farm 1, Animal Engineering Series - Sheep, Zoo Series - Farm, Nursery Series - Black Sheep and Sweet Dream.

For information about other imagery that I use in my artwork, see more of my work, etc., please visit my website or my Facebook page under Zimmerman Fine Art Studio.

Be kind and be safe.

Kathleen Zimmerman

In and Out of the Studio

During the worldwide health crisis, I like most people, am doing as we were advised to do by the health professionals, staying in-place to prevent the spread of the virus. For me, that means working alone in my studio. (Well, not totally alone, my dog Izzy is here providing her much appreciated emotional support). Anyway, I have spent most of the last couple of weeks doing the finishing touches on the drawings for some digital prints, posting images of them on my website and Facebook page, packing up the molds of my recent sculpture so they are ready to ship and now writing this post. I almost didn’t write this post, but then I decided it was better to concentrate on being productive and positive rather than the opposite. I will admit all of this wasn’t an easy thing in this time of uncertainty and concern. Staying focused and trying not to worry is definitely easier said than done, as you all know.

Izzy my studio buddy.

Izzy my studio buddy.

As fate would have it, the digital prints I needed to finish in my studio were from my YinYang Series. This series began as an exploration of what I saw as ‘so Chinese’ when I was living in China a few years ago. As I was working on it, it became evident that it was really about the concept of dualism, or the theory of YinYang. The idea of how seemingly opposite or contrary forces may actually be complementary, interconnected, and interdependent. This is so much a part of this culture’s way of looking at the world and is something to think about in our global community. While I did the initial drawing back then, I have been stalling their translation into digital prints. This was due to their number, and never seeming to find a focused period of time to deal with them all. But now that I have the time, I have become mentally ready to revisit my Chinese experience.

The YinYang Series is a series of thirty paired images. Each pair expresses a concept hinted at in it’s title. For example, Community concerns how all life forms, whether it be humans or bees, have learned to work together for their welfare and survival. Community 1 was inspired by a human-made cave dwelling while Community 2 was inspired by a beehive that was incorporated into a stone formation, I saw just outside of Beijing at different locations. Both the cave dwelling and the beehive struck me due to their visual similarity and the fact that they demonstrated tight-knit communities through it’s form and function.

The images below are just a few pairs in the YinYang Series, but the rest can be seen on the digital prints page on this website. The titles for the images in this post in order from top to bottom are; Elements 1 & 2, Farm 1 & 2, Job 1 & 2, Kart 1 & 2, Kind 1 & 2, South 1 & 2 and Vegetation 1 & 2. While I got started by telling you the inspiration and the thinking behind Community, I will let you decide for yourself what you think the inspiration and idea behind the rest of the paired prints are.

The molds I packed up were of my recent sculpture, Counting Sheep, Moon Rabbits and Community Spirit, as well as Farm Labor and Bear Hug. I have mentioned in my biography (on the artist page of this website) that Counting Sheep deals with the interpersonal dynamics of groups and that Moon Rabbits play off rabbits’ inherent form and mythical ideas surrounding these animals. But my latest sculpture, Community Spirit, is making its debut in this post. It communicates the gentleness of spirit of lambs and their desire to belong to a group or environment. Like all of these sculptures, they work visually alone as well as in groups, expressing different concepts. Farm Labor and Bear Hug are earlier works that I am now casting. I had gotten away from casting for a time due to living overseas and travel, but have once again started casting in earnest. That being said, Farm Labor honors horses for their physical strength, vitality and the labor they perform while Bear Hug expresses concerns surrounding the effects of global warming. All these sculptures will be shipped out of the studio when it is safe so they can hopefully be cast in bronze by this summer. I am scheduled for two Solo Exhibitions, one here in Connecticut and one in Vermont, and then we will have to wait and see how the situation evolves. You can see images of the plaster casts of these works of art below. They are presented in the above order both alone and in couples.

Note: If you would like more information about my casting process, I have a process page on this website under the menu listing (serigraphy, digital printmaking and casting) on this website.

A final note, I will update this post with news about the progress of the castings, about my Solo Exhibitions dates, my galleries re-openings and the next serigraphic print. In the meantime, I wish you all a safe, productive and positive month!

Kathleen Zimmerman