MERRY
KOHN ARTIST
"Where's Your Sister?"
"24 X 36"
Merry Kohn was born
on December 26, 1951 in Fort Meade, Maryland.
Being the daughter of a military
officer, and the proverbial
"army brat," Merry traveled the
world over with her family. Her many
experiences abroad stirred her creative side and
she began painting at an early age. Merry now makes her home on the
beautiful Monterey Peninsula, yet you can see the influences of her
travels through Europe, the Orient and
the United States evident in her work.
Having painted all her life, Merry is basically a self- taught artist and paints with a whimsical, yet uncompromising wit. The titles of her paintings usually indicate a joke or a story that has to be searched for in the canvas.
Having painted all her life, Merry is basically a self- taught artist and paints with a whimsical, yet uncompromising wit. The titles of her paintings usually indicate a joke or a story that has to be searched for in the canvas.
Collected internationally,
Merry's work has been shown across the
United States, in Japan and Korea. Critics and audiences of naive
art have compared her to Michel Delacroix,
Yamagata and Wysocki. Munsingwear
commissioned her in 1986 to do the
cover of their centennial annual report and,
later that year, to do the poster for their Annual Munsingwear
Bicycle Race in Crested Butte, Colorado. She has been
displayed in the Sonje Museum of Contemporary Art with artists such
as Grandma Moses, Henri Rousseau, Ivan Rabuzin
and Mattie Lou O'Kelley. Most recently, her work was
exhibited in a group show, at the Chicago Center For
Self-Taught Art. She has produced puzzles,
calendars, mugs, greeting cards and other
items for many companies including Hallmark. In 1993, Merry's
wonderful design "Made in Paris," was selected at the
European Workshop to be used by UNICEF as a 1995
Christmas Advent Calendar. It was also selected as a
Christmas card. In 1998, they produced four of her
images into cards.
In 1998, she was commissioned by the internationally renowned, Monterey Bay Aquarium, to do three painting to be made into a gift line for their stores. For 1999, and again in 2000, Hallmark produced an advent calendar from one of her snow scenes.
The happiness of childhood is recaptured in every canvas. Not one person's particular childhood, but an archetypal, idealized childhood in which we collectively share. One critic once wrote, "The feeling evoked are those of the pictures of old story books: a trace of deja vu, of daydreaming on a golden afternoon as the shadows lengthen."
In 1998, she was commissioned by the internationally renowned, Monterey Bay Aquarium, to do three painting to be made into a gift line for their stores. For 1999, and again in 2000, Hallmark produced an advent calendar from one of her snow scenes.
The happiness of childhood is recaptured in every canvas. Not one person's particular childhood, but an archetypal, idealized childhood in which we collectively share. One critic once wrote, "The feeling evoked are those of the pictures of old story books: a trace of deja vu, of daydreaming on a golden afternoon as the shadows lengthen."
"Odd Man Out"
"3 x 18"
Merry Kohn Studio 1285
Josselyn Canyon Monterey CA 93940 (831)373-2772
© Merry Kohn
All rights reserved by artist