Artist Karen Leigh is 'always looking for the light'

When well-known, and prolific, artist Karen Leigh was in the hardware store this winter to pick up some ice melt, the gentleman who carried it out to her car asked her, “So what did you used to do?”

Leigh, who’s been a professional artist for more than 50 years, laughed and replied, “I still do it.”

One of the Flathead Valley’s, and Montana’s, most esteemed artists, Leigh credits her long, successful career to a simple principle — “Get up every morning. Go to the studio. Do the work.”

Leigh believes artists need a strong work ethic, whether they’re feeling inspired or not on any given day, citing the well-known saying by American inventor Thomas Edison: “Genius is one percent inspiration and 99 percent perspiration.”

“Artists don’t retire from painting. Writers don’t retire from writing. Musicians don’t retire. It’s just your life,” she affirms.

A fourth-generation Montanan, Leigh grew up in Great Falls. She credits her supportive parents as being the greatest influence in her desire to pursue a career in art.

On a recent, clear winter morning, from her sun-dappled Kalispell studio in the Eastside Brick building — which is just across the street from Cornelius Hedges School named after her great-grandfather, the prominent U.S. attorney, judge and Montana state senator — she reflected on her life as an artist and what keeps her inspired.

Known as the “artistic one” in her school years, Leigh always took art classes.

“When I was a little kid I attended artists school. I’d do the assignments and then send them in to have critiqued,” she said. “At school, I’d be the one painting paper murals of medieval ladies and jousters.”

In junior high school, she took a biology class and then sold her botanical illustrations to the other students.

Leigh obtained a degree in graphic design from Montana State University, recalling how fun those years were when her teacher Bob DeWeese would take the class to the woods to paint.

She has studied under some of the finest watercolor masters — Irving Shapiro, Skip Lawrence, Joseph Zbukvic and Carla O'Connor.

OVER THE life of her career, Leigh’s transparent watercolors have garnered both national attention and numerous awards. A signature member of the Montana Watercolor Society, in 2007 Leigh was chosen to design an ornament for the White House Christmas tree, now part of the permanent collection of the George W. Bush Presidential Library.

For three years she and local artist Gini Ogle participated in the Smithsonian Institute’s Graceful Envelope contest and traveling exhibit. Their design featuring Leigh’s watercolor and Ogle’s calligraphy was selected for the exhibit’s poster and catalog cover in 2004.

Last year Leigh took the first place Watermedia Award in the Montana Watercolor Society’s annual national juried exhibition.

Most recently, Leigh’s watercolor “Mood Indigo” took first place in the People’s Choice Awards at the Hockaday Museum of Art’s 2022 Members Salon exhibit.

A lifelong student, Leigh continues taking art classes and workshops. She is also an adjunct professor at Flathead Valley Community College and in 2023 will celebrate her 50th anniversary of teaching art.

“I truly enjoy my students. They’re amazing,” Leigh said. “My classes usually have half new students and half older, retired students. It’s a great balance.”

She says she thinks of her classes as a tribe.

“We make lifelong friends. We share a common bond. No matter their station in life, that all gets left at the door.”

Leigh also teaches art for FVCC’s Senior Institute every spring.

“At the end of class I’ll ask my students, ‘Did you think about anything else today?’ and they realize that in those two hours they were totally focused on the right side of their brains. It’s so healthy.”

Her advice to aspiring artists is to sign up for classes and workshops.

“You’ll never walk away knowing less than when you went in,” she tells them.

LEIGH HAS hundreds of en plein air sketchbooks, which she considers her diary, from her travels, both globally and across the country and Montana. She’s traveled extensively in Europe, particularly Italy. Through FVCC art professor Susan Guthrie, Leigh taught for FVCC’s Semester Abroad Venice program.

In Umbria, she attended a workshop at La Romita School of Art, held in a 14th century monastery, where each morning the students would be dropped off in tiny hill towns and spend the day sketching.

She taught a painting class in Monet’s Gardens in Giverny, France, accompanied by her daughter, and stood in Van Gogh’s room in St. Remy in the asylum where he stayed near the end of his life, looking out at the still unchanged landscape – quintessential moments forever instilled in her memory.

Leigh says she’s drawn more to urban landscapes than those of Glacier Park for her subjects.

“There are so many good landscape painters here already,” she said. “I’m happier in urban settings like New York City, San Francisco and places like Morro Bay in California — places with boats, action, people doing things … and I love portraits.”

She fondly recalls how, over the course of about 10 years in all seasons, she and two of her best friends would take off together traveling across Montana, painting and doing shows.

In the late ‘70s, Leigh served as the executive director of the Hockaday Museum of Art. During those years the Hockaday built a ceramics studio, darkroom, taught cooking classes and had piano recitals and plays. She is still a Hockaday member and enjoys visiting and participating in the shows.

“It’s an important part of the community, for sure,” she said.

As for approach to her work, Leigh says she, like all artists, is “always looking for the light.”

“Not everything I do pleases me,” she said. “Sometimes I have to turn it over and paint on the other side.

“That’s one thing about painting — I’ll never figure it all out. Every painting is a new and unique challenge, but there has to be that balance between control and freedom. It’s been a great journey to be on.”

Community editor Carol Marino may be reached at 406-758-4440 or community@dailyinterlake.com.