Kathy Florentz
Painter
I attended Pratt Institute, majoring in printmaking but also was involved with photography, graphic and environmental design. My most influential teachers were the filmmaker and photographer, Susan Kleckner and the painter Jake Berthold. My passion for personal color and sensual surface can be credited to Berthold’s emphasis on both; exemplified in his work, associated with a style called lyrical abstraction. Susan Kleckner was only one of three female teachers in the art school, and an advocate for moving the needle towards acceptance of the female perspective in art. Her legacy, for me was to learn to really see and become more perceptive visually through photography.
I worked in intaglio, serigraphs and woodblock prints at the Pratt Graphics Center in Manhattan and also had work exhibited in the gallery there.
During these years, I exhibited my work widely in group shows especially with Women in the Arts Foundation. One of the highlights was an exhibit juried by Linda Shearer, who was at that time assistant curator at the Guggenheim Museum. Twelve artists were chosen for this show at the Sarah Institute in New York City. We had many exhibits, including at Lincoln Center and other important cultural venues.
I moved to southern New Jersey in the late ‘80s and became part of a welcoming community of artists and was able to have my work exhibited in several juried shows.
I received an award in an exhibit at Rowan University called “Southern Exposure”. It was juried by Mark Rosenthal, who was then curator of twentieth century art at the Philadelphia Museum of Art.
I had three solo exhibitions, one at the Kling Gallery in Philadelphia, one at the Pavilion Gallery at Burlington County Memorial Hospital, and one provided by the Perkins Center for the Arts at Commerce Bank in Moorestown, NJ.
I moved to Pennsylvania in 1993. For the past few years, I’ve been exploring new approaches to painting, focusing more on abstraction. This summer, a video I produced is included in "Radius" at the Delaware Contemporary museum in Wilmington.
Another painting is included in a group show at the Community Art Center in Wallingford, PA. I’ve been attending intensive workshops with an Irish artist named Tim Hawkesworth in Norristown and upstate Pennsylvania. I’ve also worked with Kaseem Amoudi at PAFA and Marianne Mitchell at the Vero Beach Museum of Art.
Studio 8
Kathy Florentz
Painter
I attended Pratt Institute, majoring in printmaking but also was involved with photography, graphic and environmental design. My most influential teachers were the filmmaker and photographer, Susan Kleckner and the painter Jake Berthold. My passion for personal color and sensual surface can be credited to Berthold’s emphasis on both; exemplified in his work, associated with a style called lyrical abstraction. Susan Kleckner was only one of three female teachers in the art school, and an advocate for moving the needle towards acceptance of the female perspective in art. Her legacy, for me was to learn to really see and become more perceptive visually through photography.
I worked in intaglio, serigraphs and woodblock prints at the Pratt Graphics Center in Manhattan and also had work exhibited in the gallery there.
During these years, I exhibited my work widely in group shows especially with Women in the Arts Foundation. One of the highlights was an exhibit juried by Linda Shearer, who was at that time assistant curator at the Guggenheim Museum. Twelve artists were chosen for this show at the Sarah Institute in New York City. We had many exhibits, including at Lincoln Center and other important cultural venues.
I moved to southern New Jersey in the late ‘80s and became part of a welcoming community of artists and was able to have my work exhibited in several juried shows.
I received an award in an exhibit at Rowan University called “Southern Exposure”. It was juried by Mark Rosenthal, who was then curator of twentieth century art at the Philadelphia Museum of Art.
I had three solo exhibitions, one at the Kling Gallery in Philadelphia, one at the Pavilion Gallery at Burlington County Memorial Hospital, and one provided by the Perkins Center for the Arts at Commerce Bank in Moorestown, NJ.
I moved to Pennsylvania in 1993. For the past few years, I’ve been exploring new approaches to painting, focusing more on abstraction. This summer, a video I produced is included in "Radius" at the Delaware Contemporary museum in Wilmington.
Another painting is included in a group show at the Community Art Center in Wallingford, PA. I’ve been attending intensive workshops with an Irish artist named Tim Hawkesworth in Norristown and upstate Pennsylvania. I’ve also worked with Kaseem Amoudi at PAFA and Marianne Mitchell at the Vero Beach Museum of Art.
Studio 8