Featured Artist Kitty Harvill

Kitty Harvill’s beautiful watercolors, pastels and acrylics highlight her deep commitment to raising awareness of the endangered rainforests of Brazil. Please visit her website to see more of her art and to find out more about her passion.

 

 

It’s interesting for me to look back and see how a childhood dream has become a reality, a convoluted journey to living my passion and that dream.

 

 

As a child in elementary school I chose projects and filled notebooks with clippings of tropical flowers, birds, and animals of Brazil. My big dream as I grew older was always to do something to help the Amazon Rainforest. I remember in my twenties visiting the Amazon Rainforest exhibit in Central Park, NY, and that dream intensified. At the time, it was only that, a dream.

 

 

As my life has unfolded and circumstances have presented themselves to me, I did eventually find myself in the Amazon, but interestingly my passion has mainly focused on another and lesser known Brazilian rainforest–­ the Atlantic Forest. This forest once covered most of the eastern and southeastern regions of Brazil. Today, due to urban sprawl and agriculture it is only seven percent intact.

 

 

This forest and other Brazilian ecosystems under threat, such as the Cerrado, or Savanna, are where my artistic efforts have been focused primarily since 2006 which marked the beginning of my career as a wildlife and nature artist.

 

 

My new life in the tropics brought me back to working in oils and acrylics again, due to the problems with works on paper in such a humid climate; however, I have painted in watercolor for thirty years, and it is a medium I still use and will always love, as well as pastel. My subject matter dictates my choice of medium in an intuitive way.

 

 

I am an American, now with dual residency in the U.S. and Brazil, and a Signature member of Artists for Conservation. I feel there is so much need in the world at this moment to raise awareness of all wildlife and the habitats that we humans are destroying at an alarming rate.

 

 

This past year I created a Facebook group : 52 WEEKS ­ Nature Painting Challenge. We have members on four continents, and many of our weekly challenges focus on endangered species in different parts of the world through partnerships with biologists working to help save these species.

 

 

I am interested in broader exposure for my work, but the basis of this is to bring to light the fact that in the last 40 years we have lost half of the wildlife on the planet.

 

 

My deepest desire is to elicit an emotional response that motivates others to act on behalf of our beautiful planet, in support of conservation efforts.

 

Kitty Harvill invites you to follow her on Facebook.

 

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