KATHERINE GAMAO

Artist. Designer. Retoucher.

I still remember the first time I realized I was in love with art. I was in the 2nd grade and our assignment was to draw the Statue of Liberty. For reference, our teacher provided small replicas and various books on New York City. I found myself continually walking to the front of the class to get a closer look at the items. It was very important to me that my drawing was a masterpiece. As all the other students completed their drawings, I wished I had more time to complete my vision. I still have this significant piece of crayon art and I cherish it dearly.
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As a child, I had a very vivid imagination and I spent much of my time on art. I would draw with colored pencils, color in coloring books, and paint with children's watercolor sets. I remember creating still-life pictures of just about everything in our home. I would often tear advertisements out of magazines or recreate book covers that I liked. I would even make portraits of family members that were willing to sit for long enough. By the time I was 10, I was begging my parents to enroll me in art classes. At the age of 12, I began attending summer art camp from Marcia Fouquet at the Great Falls Art Center. Marcia taught me about figure proportions and portrait drawing. By the time I was 13, Marcia started me in oil painting as well. She taught me color mixing and medium techniques that I used to create my first oil painting of a fruit still-life. ​​

After successfully completing three still-life paintings, Marcia had me join the adult painting classes on a weekly basis. We concentrated heavily on recreating portrait paintings by masters such as Renoir, Picasso, and van Gogh.

​By the time I graduated high school, I had completed 5 years of art classes at the Great Falls Art Center, in addition to school electives such as Graphic Design and Architectural Drawing. Despite my obvious interests, my parents urged me to study anything but art. In the fall of 1996, I attended college at the Virginia Polytechnic Institute in Blacksburg, VA with the intention of studying marketing. During my sophomore year, I had room in my schedule to take an art elective. Life Drawing reminded me of how much I loved art (and just how bad I was at business classes such as Accounting and Economics!). By the following spring semester, I officially switched my major to Fine Arts with a concentration in Graphic Design and graduated with flying colors in May of 2000.
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Over the past 20+ years, I have worked at various companies as a Graphic Artist, Designer and Photo Retoucher. Now as a mother to 2 beautiful children, I freelance from a home office and still enjoy engaging in all things creative, especially with my girls.
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