Artist Name: Kathleen Howard Piper
Medium: paintings in oils, sculpture in ceramic and glass.
Phone Number: 541-302-6418
Email Address: zhukov@worldnet.att.net

I had my first solo show in 1980, and have exhibited regularly since then. I began working with glass in 1985, and ceramics, wood, and metal since moving to Eugene in 1999. At this point, I do oil paintings, small sculpture, glass, and mixed media pieces.
With a masters degree is in cultural anthropology; I am familiar with the artwork and expressions of peoples from all over the world. I believe a style embodies the cultural vision of a particular people, and cannot be translated to another—all the copies we see of native and aboriginal arts reflect, at bottom, the vision of our own cultural bankruptcy and drive to commodity the earth.
That being said, where do I stand as an artist? What sort of vision have I to offer? Let me state at the outset that I believe the most authentic pieces of art in the United States are the little figures of deer, children, lizards, and so forth that serve as traffic warnings along our roadways. There, if anywhere, we have art serving its traditional function as a direct and seamless embodiment of cultural values. The rest, particularly what we call Fine Art, is problematical.
I find that these problems of cultural context greatly affect my work, particularly in choices about where I show and sell it, but also in its themes and subject matter. I take refuge in the eternal verities of landscape, light, feeling, and figure. I make an attempt to allow the direct voice of natural forms to speak though me. I approach my materials with respect and allow them to teach me. Many of my pieces look radically different as the light across them changes; most embody change in some way. What emerges may be convoluted or peaceful, whole or broken, often ambiguous or problematical—looking around us, what is not?
We are broken as a people. Our art cannot be easy, restful, pretty, and at the same time authentic, given our present place in the world. And yet some quality of mercy, hope, or reprieve is a most human desire, here as always.
I make art with the emergence of wonder and hope, and in the recognition of madness, as a conscious piece of the eternal changing balance.

Kathleen Howard Piper’s work is currently on display at
New Zone Gallery, Broadway, Eugene, Oregon
Core Star Cultural Center, 439 W. 2nd St. Eugene, Oregon

She has placed work in more than 64 shows in Northern California and the Pacific Northwest, and has participated regularly in New Zone shows since 2003