Art Springs in Gladstone is almost here!

Winter is over and Spring is finally here. Time to celebrate with Gladstones' first annual juried fine art show coming up this month, Friday, April 18th, from 6:30pm to 9:00pm and Saturday, April 19th, from 10:00am to 5:00pm.


Over 40 artists will show and sell their work at the new Gladstone Community Center, 6901 N Holmes, across from City Hall. Below are just some of the artists appearing at the show. Listed to the right are our wonderful sponsors who helped make it all possible.

Jennifer Haskin

Art Springs in Gladstone is Jennifer Haskin’s first juried art show. Her focus is in portrait art. Drawing people is a passion for Jennifer, as she believes that expressions and emotion are art forms in themselves. Jennifer began teaching herself portrait art with a mechanical pencil drawing her first son, 10 years ago. Exploration soon led from graphite to colored pencil. Recently, she has embarked on an adventure with watercolor portraits. Watercolor has become an all-consuming drive as faces come alive with the flowing of color.

Jennifer has practiced her art in Montana, Colorado and now Missouri. She hopes to do more full-time work and join art leagues in the Kansas City area. Jennifer works from her home while caring for her greatest supporters; her husband David, and five children.

Trish Walker

Although I will try any medium, my true loves are oil painting and graphite portraits. I have only been involved in the arts for a mere seven years but it has been a passionate and fulfilling time. Being able to create a piece of art that brings a smile to a face or a tear to the eye, is my measurement of success.

I am a Kansas City native and a Gladstone resident for more than 20 years. I have been involved in the Northland Art League for the past four years and serve as the Recording Secretary. Currently, I teach a Graphite Portrait class thru the North Kansas City Communiversity Program. I thoroughly enjoy teaching someone who gets as excited as I do when they see their first attempt to draw a portrait.

My biggest fan and supporter is my husband and friend, and to him I will be eternally grateful.

Rebecca Koop

Back Door Pottery , Potter Rebecca Koop offers retail pottery and evening classes in wheel throwing and hand built pottery. Rebecca also teaches periodic workshops both independently and through Communiversity and North Kansas City Schools community education services. One of her loves is colorful fish and mermaid forms in terra cotta. Her main focus is on high-fire stoneware because of its durability and warm, earthy character. She enjoys creating everyday art for her customers' table, kitchen or home."Clay is an art form you can wrap your hands around as well as enjoy the sculptural simplicity of form."

Diane Stolz

Diane Stolz presently has works in many venues in Kansas City, Wichita, and most recently Louisiana Watercolor Society's International Juried Exhibition.

Her works can be seen at the 12th Annual Heartland Artists Exhibition in Merriam at the Irene B. French Gallery in the Community Center, Pastel national 2008 in the new Whichita Center for the Arts, Buttonwood Financial Gallery, 3013 Main St, KC; Watercolor Missouri National in Fulton, MO and at the 2008 Juried Exhibition at Art at the Center, City of Overland Park at 6000 College Blvd, KS.

Diane will have original art pieces and prints for sale at Artsprings in Gladstone in April.

Lee Hinderliter

Most of my paintings are impressionistic and based on a real encounter with a point of view that has caught my fancy. My preference is to sketch on location. My goal is to convey the essence of the place. I also am intrigued by design, and strive to distill shape and color into stylized or abstract works. I am a native of Kansas and earned a bachelor's degree in art education from the University of Kansas. During the more than 40 years I lived in New Jersey I studied with several N.J. watercolorists and participated in over 100 juried art shows. I returned to the Heartland in 2000.I am a charter member of the National Museum of Women in the Arts. I have been a member of the Northland Art League for 7 years, and was president for the past two years. My work can be found at the Northland Exposure Gallery in Parkville, MO.

Karen Kay

I am a painter, illustrator, sculptor, graphic designer, photographer, and crafter. Yes, I love to do it all! My work is whimsical, colorful, cheeky and fun. I like to create pieces that speak to the heart and put a smile on the face.

I can't imagine a day without working on a project or painting or just sketching and writing down ideas. My daily inspiration comes from the smile on a child’s face, a warm summer day, an antique rocker, music and TV commercials, which I love to watch! Most of my ideas come when I am alone, listening to music or even in my dreams.

I think art should be fun, colorful and full of life. If my art makes you smile, then my mission has been accomplished. My recent use of words in my work simply takes it to another level of meaning for the viewer.

I have a degree in graphic design from the Art Institute of Pittsburgh and have lived in Kansas City most of my life. My work can be viewed at Gifted Hands in Crown Center, Kansas City, MO and online at KarenKayArtworks.com.

Nancy Reese

Nancy has been working with metal since 1975 in creating small 3D sculptures. Her work has evolved into the present contemporary wall hangings. These designs give the freedom to explore shape, form, color and texture. Each one is unique and one of a kind. They vary from fluidic curves to shapes with an art deco flavor. Nancy tries to give each piece a movement and flow that excites the eye. The steel is gilded by using gold and silver leafing. Original ceramic pieces are incorporated into the design for another dimension of color and texture.

Barbara Akers

I have a B.S. in Biology and Chemistry, which has nothing to do with art. Art was a means of taking a break from science and logic and letting the other half of my brain take over.

It started with pencils, progressed to pottery and then finally settled into painting and woodcarving. My current focus is on watercolor, woodcarving, and pyrography, not necessarily separated at times. I've also started getting back into pastels.

I have taken classes with local artists, the late Jack Smith, Margaret McCarthy (watercolor), Loretta Feeback and Holly Schenk (pastels), Fern Webber (woodcarving), and Sheila Hunter (pyrography). I also have had some illustrations published as well as a short story in two charity anthologies (Animal Magnetism and Southern Comfort).

I am a member of the Northland Art League (served as 2nd VP for the Northland Art League in 2005), the Kansas City Woodcarvers' Club, and the National Woodcarvers Association. My work can currently be seen at Northland Exposure Art Gallery in Parkville, Missouri.

Larry Roggenkamp

Larry Roggenkamp is a professional artist in the Kansas City area. For many years, photography has been a passion for this artist. Mr. Roggenkamp currently takes an artistic approach to images, starting with a photograph and making enhancements using computer software. Mr. Roggenkamp is a member of the Northland Exposure Artist’s Gallery in Parkville, MO.

Holly Schenk

Holly Schenk grew up in Nebraska where she received both a Bachelors and a Masters degree in Art Education. Her teaching experience includes all age levels in both public and private venues. After moving to the Kansas City area in 1982, Holly worked at Hallmark Cards as an art director for 12 years. She continues to teach part-time and proudly claims that most of her time goes into mom duties.

Through her teaching and directing experiences, she learned how to create in many different media. She loves to use color in a strong way and enjoys when the viewer can see things from her viewpoint. Pastels and painting media are Hollys' favorites but she'll also venture into collage, photography, fine crafts, calligraphy, and caricatures.

Roger Cissner

Many of us find that we are in a constant race to quickly get somewhere else, sometimes to the detriment of looking at where we are.”For the past twenty plus years Roger has made his home in Plattsburg, Missouri, a rural farming community north of Kansas City and Smithville Lake.There are two main focuses Roger concentrates on when presenting his photography. First, and foremost is to present photography as an expressive fine art medium.The second is to show the wonderful views, both large and small, that surround us. It is within this focus that an attempt is made to capture images that offer a feeling of tranquility and peace. Roger’s photography emphasizes the natural ambiance of Northwestern Missouri along with images of his far-ranging travel destinations. His portfolio consists primarily of floral, animal and landscape subjects.Roger utilizes a manual film camera to capture his images and predominantly uses color film to fully emphasize the beauty of the selected subjects.

Herman Scharhag

After a career of 40 years as a successful architect, Herman Scharhag has now embarked on a greater challenge: to be one of the best watercolor artists in the area. His architectural background, combined with form, sense of vivid color, and keen eye for beauty have produced many beautiful paintings. His watercolors, in a wet and fluid style, express the spontaneity likened to the Impressionists, yet retain the rigid discipline of his background.
Mr. Scharhag’s work can be viewed at the following locations: Northland Exposure Artist Gallery in Parkville, Images II of K.C., as well as his personal studio.

Don Dane

Don is a self-taught artist who likes the realistic style of painting and drawing. He has become well known for his portrayal of the American west and the cowboy way of life. Don spends a great deal of time on working cattle ranches from Kansas to Arizona. It’s on these ranches that he gains the knowledge and photographic references for his paintings. Many of these paintings have been reproduced on over a dozen western and bluegrass posters at festivals around the country. Don’s work has been featured in Western Horseman, American Cowboy Magazine, Art of the West and on CowboyPoetry.com.

Don works from his home/studio located in Olathe, Kansas. He is currently represented by The Rice Gallery of Fine Art in Overland Park, KS.

Chun Wang

Painting has been a part of my life ever since I was a kid. It became more and more significant in my life as I earned my undergraduate degree in China and master degree in the United States in fine art . I especially love to paint from real life in oil. The liveliness and energy of my surroundings, the sky, the people, the landscapes, the street scenes, and their magical and endless changes move me. I seek to represent these subjects poetically and with emotion. I have participated and won prizes in many shows including the Oil Painters of America Annual Exhibition. Many of my painting are collected publicly and privately.

Bob Holloway

Bob Price Holloway is a native Missourian. Born in 1928 in Centralia, he was raised in nearby Columbia. In 1942, he moved to Kansas City where he attended Westport High School and was "inspired, motivated and taught" by art teacher Shelton Wilhite.

Professionally, he received on-the-job training in the commercial art department of Western Auto Supply Company. In 1954 he became an advertising agency art director, receiving many art directors club awards for both print and television throughout his career.

In 1952 he participated in his first art fair and has received numerous awards in painting and drawing. Today, he participates in 40 shows a year in over 17 states. His paintings, drawings and prints are displayed in homes and businesses in every state and the Virgin Islands and in several countries including Argentina, Greece, Italy, Luxembourg and Switzerland, just to name a few.

Glen Hunter

Glen currently resides in Kansas City, Missouri, near Liberty. He attended Longview and Maplewoods Community Colleges and the Kansas City Art Institute, with his major in Graphic Design.

Glen has worked almost exclusively with the airbrush for over 25 years in a variety of uses that includes photo retouching, graphic design and illustration and fine arts using acrylic oil paints and pigment dyes.

The particular series of paintings exhibited are a culmination of graphic and color experiments I have done attempting to give a three-dimensional quality to basic geometric shapes with the use of color and the airbrush. The airbrush is well suited for rendering objects using soft light and shadow, the technique of “chiaroscuro.”

Ideas for abstract paintings are first "roughed-in" and created in various computer graphic programs, analyzed, and modified until I feel the right combination of shapes and colors work together, then transferred to canvas, masked-off, and airbrushed to color match what was originally created in the computer.

Steve Cox

From Steve Cox’s twenty plus years in the jewelry industry, he approaches art jewelry from the standpoint that even though it is art, it is jewelry and needs to meet the demands of being worn.

Steve’s undaunted passion for the whole process in the creation of a piece raises his work above those who use commercial parts or findings. All pieces start as raw material. Melted down (alloyed if necessary), poured into ingots, forged and rolled into sheets. Some are drawn into wire (all chains are made from wire produced in his studio), some hammered, fused etc. He remains fluid enough to recognize those fortunate mistakes, unexpected texture or a pleasing curve that makes the final outcome more of a creative relationship between himself, the metal and the stone.

Lois Neal

My body of work in clay is slab constructed and wheelthrown vessels with thematic impressions and hand carved appendages attached for extension of form and continuity of style. These dramatic pieces are glazed with crackle or metallic reactive glazes and then fired using an atmospheric reduction process called Raku. This ancient Japanese firing method demands that a specially formulated clay body be used that can withstand the procedure of firing to approximately 1800 deg. F followed by rapid cooling. Each creation in clay has it's own unique variation in color due to the spontaneous nature of the firing technique. My husband and I established our art studio at Squires, MO, in 1992 having moved from Phoenix, AZ, where I recieved my clay education followed by years of teaching and exhib- iting in the Southwest. I am currently exhibiting at selected galleries and art fairs around the country.