1760
Superior St
P.O. Box 126
Three Lakes, WI
54562
715-546-2299
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Last updated:
01/26/2012
Our Mission:
“Founded
in 2003, our mission is to celebrate and promote the arts in the Northwoods.
The Three Lakes Center for the Arts seeks to enhance the quality of community
life for its citizens, part-time residents and visitors as a magnet for art in
its varied forms for the enjoyment and education of all.”
Karen Lenhart,
September 2011 Artist of the Month
by Gay Scheffen
Karen Lenhart walked down the inclined drive from her house, Cisco Lake glistening from beyond the sprawling deck and timbered shoreline. Smiling as she moved with grace and purpose, accompanied by her yellow lab Bently, one could see immediately that this is a woman with a great sense of herself, a confidence which comes from hard work and accomplishment. “I just am who I am,” she said.
She pointed out the apparatus and the shed in which her husband, Philip, makes maple syrup each year. There is a pole barn and a large building for his workshop and storage. Flowers are everywhere. “I’m an avid gardener,” Lenhart said. A path winds through bushes and plantings, adorned here and there by wood sculptures, up to the entrance of the Lenharts’ inviting home. The house has been evolving since they first bought the small cabin, more than forty years ago and began to add on.
When Lenharts married, they first lived in Delavan, WI. Philip taught wood shop and a fellow teacher invited them to vacation in his Northern WI home. “We spent more time there than he did,” Lenhart said, “so we decided to buy a place of our own. We bought the cabin in ’68 and started adding on in 1970. We did it all ourselves.”
Did they literally do it all themselves – do everything from the foundation up? “Yah –yah, yah,” she answered. This little affirmation punctuates many of her sentences. “You should have seen us sitting on a wall, reading the ‘how to’ book on foundations. Phillip can do everything.”
A tour of the house began with Lenhart’s studio. The first area is for framing, matting and mounting prints. Many of her paintings lean up against one another on the floor. There are some abstracts, not typical of the Lenhart work one usually sees. “Most of my abstracts are commissioned,” she said. She is working on one done on Yupo (a brand name) paper, a plastic surface which is slippery to work with and creates an unusual look.
Her well known paintings of foxes, wolves, deer and birch trees are everywhere. She is doing a commissioned painting of a large birch with rocks and wildflowers. The table where she paints is in a corner of the room. There is a window in front and to the right with a view of the lake. A box above the work area provides color corrected light. There are books and photos and clippings. “Most artists save a lot of reference materials,” she said.
Lenhart’s favorite medium is watercolor. She paints from both memory and photographs. “Although my photos serve to initiate the creative process, once I begin painting, it is the ‘spirit’ of the subject that guides my creativity.”
The rest of the house has paintings on the walls that are not all Lenhart’s. She is happily surrounded by some of her favorite artists, including Steve Hanks, known as one of the finest watercolor artists in the country. The family photographs are there on the refrigerator. She has two grandchildren, a girl and a boy. There is a warm mix of antiques and cozy furnishings. “I like old things,” she said. Native American inspired wall hangings with willow, pony beads and feathers are among Lenhart’s creations.
There are also her carvings of Father Christmas. She enjoys wood work and has carved many walking sticks, as well. The Adirondack chairs by the fire pit are more of her work and she made the bent willow chair in the sun room. She learned the process in a class at Trees for Tomorrow in Eagle River. “My whole thing is – I could take classes forever. I am interested in every form of art.”
Lenhart was born in Clintonville, WI on a dairy farm. She grew up with four sisters and two brothers. “I was the biggest and the oldest and did the bulk of the farm work,” she said. “I always liked to draw – mainly horses. In high school I took art class. There was a gifted girl in class and the instructor spent all of his time with her.” But the gifted girl never did anything with her talent and it was Lenhart who eventually followed through.
After high school, Lenhart moved to Madison and lived first with an aunt and uncle and then in an apartment with girlfriends. She worked in the circulation department of a newspaper. She married, moved to Delavan and had two daughters. In 1970, the family returned to Madison and when the girls were in 4th and 5th grade, Lenhart attended UW - Madison for her BS in Art Education. Ultimately, Lenhart’s husband was laid off work as a shop teacher. Since the family needed insurance, Lenhart had to give up teaching and went to work for the National Guardian Life Insurance Co. She retired as the Vice President and Director of Operations in 2001.
Since their permanent move to the home on the Cisco Chain in Watersmeet, MI, Lenhart has committed full time to her art. She has studied with Karlyn Holman and others. She is excited about attending a class in Oct. with Morton Solberg at the Richeson School of Art in Kimberly, WI. Lenhart is the proverbial rolling stone who gathers no moss - but if she did gather moss, she’d surely create something wonderful with it.
Lenhart is the chair of Art Impressions in Land O’Lakes, the secretary of the Artistree Gallery in Land O’Lakes and the secretary of LOLA (Land O’ Lakes Area Artisans Inc.) She belongs to Headwaters Art League, the Manito Art League and the WI Regional Artists Assn. She is also an associate member of the Lakeland Art League in Minocqua and the National Watercolor Society. Lenhart’s list of awards from shows and exhibits is far too lengthy to include here. However, she recently won the Manito Art League Merit Award and a Nicolet College Purchase Award in the Northern National Art Competition.
Lenhart’s paintings are available at the Artistree Gallery in Land O’Lakes and Arlene’s Pottery and Gallery in Boulder Junction, as well as online at www.northwoodsartists.com. Email pklenhart@peoplepc.com