We had the good fortune of connecting with Pam Reinke and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Pam, is there something that you feel is most responsible for your success?
I think what has been significant in the way I teach kids art -starting in second grade, is I present difficult concepts, almost advanced drawing and painting skills. Which provides results that shows exceeding improvement over less time. I also think being a successful artist in the community proves to the I know what I am talking about, they trust and admire what I have to present. Plus I am sort of goofy and funny and never treat them like they are silly kids but young people I really care for. : )

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?
My art work is a big dose of massive color, most people without seeing my signature will know it ‘s mine. I think also what stands me a part is I am a rare women who has made my living off my art solo on my own. No one to share expenses with, no one to assist in selling, marketing, or support. I have done it on my own full time for 32 years. Enough success to able to acquire a beautiful home in 2000.

I have had many style/ brands of art work that were widely successful. Starting with a licensing contract with Blue Mountain Art cards featuring my poetry, the stick figured Glyphies and Wild Women series put me on the map, to be followed by Magnetic Women and the most recent abstract Storytellers series. The thing they all have in common is words and color!

How did I get here? Undoubtedly commitment to my art. My poetry was heart felt and drew women to be inspired to love theirselves more, this included the Wild Women series, playful faceless female stick figures who sold wildly. Locally my notoriety came from being involved in the community. I donated paintings for raffles and auctions to benefit the local Humane Society and theatre. People began to recognize my work and seek me out. I also began paining barstools with famous artists on them as a teaching tool for my young artists, which then became a local fundraiser, in which I have painted nearly 25 barstools in 10 years.

How did I face challenges? I think I wanted to make a living at my art so determinedly, I wouldn’t give up. I often took on little insignificant jobs to pay the bills. Or Sometimes bigger too good to be true arrangements, choices that were disastrous. Like a bad book deal, when it fell through I wasn’t allowed to secure the rights to my work or characters. It was devastating to work 6 months on something I no longer owned. This was a very creative bankrupt time, I nearly lost everything and then I found the classroom and little artists wanting to learn. : )

The lessons I have learned along the way was to know my worth, value and to know my RIGHTS as an artist. I no longer take on little jobs to get by, I will hold onto my work for the right price and I make sure I have a contract for any commissioned work to secure my rights to my images and intellectual property. It not anything anyone really tells a young artist.. But I do pass this lesson onto my budding artists.

What do I want the world to know about my work? That it is always changing, that I am influenced by what I see and feel about the world. I want my work to get your attention from across the room. By it’s vibrant color and graphic nature, I want my work to invoke a feeling, a response, to move the viewer, to tell a story and inspire.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
First we would spend the morning in my backyard with my version of good coffee. Although I live in the desert, I have created an oasis of wonder out my back door. I often say it is my best masterpiece.

Then we would head to SARA s park. Only a 15 minute drive, where a beautiful mountain range waits. With endless trails and sprawling rugged landscapes. Not a lot of green but no one will notice that. My two dogs will join us and we will chuckle and their joyful freedom. We will hike to the lake and have a granola bar on the beach.

Lunch will be at the hidden away Bad *ss Taco place, tucked between buildings and a parking lot, (a gem I just discovered) where we will eat vegetarian tacos with a kick.

We will head to the lake and the famous channel and London Bridge. Follow the walking path through wooded parks and open waterways, we will check out my studio. Where my front door opens up to that very big antique ( second largest in the world) “What view,” my friend will say. Inside the Pam Reinke Studio is 700 square feet of paintings, collaboratives and hanging paper dolls designed by artists to represent themselves. Four tables laid out in a T shape gives the participants a chance to converse and share as they work. 12 seat limit. We stop to sit on the patio a bit to admire the view.

The afternoon will find us at the beach, with something to paddle, a kayak, or paddle board or my favorite an OC 1. If we are in shape we will paddle around the island under the bridge and back which it a total of 6 miles.

The early evening will find us on the Sunset Charter with wine, a pontoon boat that will travel to the famous Copper Canyon. We will learn historical facts about the area, the bridge and the lake from Janine and Kenny Samp.

Finally back to my back yard with wine in hands watching the light show of dancing lights and chatting about our fave parts of the day.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
I will answer this question with a group, Paint Posse and an individual student, Faith Davis.

While working in a school system from 2012-2016, I was bankrupt, creatively and financially. I started doing the Paint and Sip events around town and attracted a rather immediate following. Mostly women who were in their late 60s and whom had never painted or not very much. They were finding success and a love of learning to paint with my way of teaching. The same ladies would show up everywhere I was and they would bring their friends. I ran out of room all the time. I had a feeling at that time these women would be significant and they are. When I opened my studio in 2016, I created a special class for them called the Paint Posse. These women were creating connections with one another and became friends. When our paintings started piling up I suggested ‘painting for purpose.’ We created collaboratives to sell for the Faith Fund. A college fund for a student who had demonstrated their creative and leadership skills in the community, which introduces my next important person.

Faith Davis showed up at my studio in 2017 as a young 11 year old, wanna be artist, anxious to learn and be apart of my studio in anyway possible. She was a dream student, excited, talented, kind and caring, loving all things art. She came as a sixth grader and just recently is off to NAU to study art at 18. During covid, this young lady not in school, became a part of the Paint Posse. She was surrounded by support and affection and the women who she began to call her ‘Paint Posse grandmothers’. When Faith out aged of the kids classes she became my right hand and brain. She volunteered for the younger kids classes, demonstrating supreme leadership and teaching skills and a collection of kids who adored her. Her artwork is beautiful, very stylized and in every aspect of her life… she is positive and effervescent.

With this combination of painting for a purpose, having a girl we adored, we created the Faith Fund and was able to give her a significant amount of money to send her on her way. The paint Posse ladies have been together for 7 years. A fiesta fun loud group of ladies living their best creative life.

Website: www.pamreinke.com

Instagram: pamreinke

Facebook: Pam Reinke and Pam Reinke Studio

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