We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Donna Wallerstein . We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Donna below.

Donna, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. We’d love to have you retell us the story behind how you came up with the idea for your business, I think our audience would really enjoy hearing the backstory.

I have a background in Textile Art and English Literature. I was struggling as a Middle School English Teacher after the pandemic. The education system had changed drastically. I quite my teaching job mid-year and knew that I needed to focus my energy on my family, in whatever capacity I could. I took 2 months to “Figure it out.”

I thought long and hard about what I had a passion for and well, I had built an amazing art studio for my husband. He was creating tons of artwork. I love his work and know others would too. We live in an area that is super supportive to artists and creatives so, BrunkyArt was born in March of 2022!

Once I had the idea for the business, I did research on what local printing company was best for high quality fine art prints. Miller IDS has been in Austin for over 75 years and Dana, the color master at Miller was the person for the job. I then focused on the website, and came up with my overall business strategy and goal for the business… To offer the best quality prints and original Texas flora and fauna art from my husband, Jason, in NORMAL Sizes.

Artists often do not consider the size of art for their customers. When our customers purchase a print from us, I wanted the art to be matted and ready to go in a frame in someone’s home. Often times (from experience) once artwork is purchased it sits in a room or shelf waiting for a mat or frame or worse… waiting for a custom frame to be created. I really wanted our customers to buy the art and immediately frame it in easy to find frame size (11X14 and 12X12 inches). I know, from experience buying art, that the thrill of finding that perfect piece can be lost when frustration kicks in because now you have to custom order a frame for that weird sized art you love.

I knew what I didn’t want, knew what I was good at, knew what I needed to hire out for, and I believe that no one person can do it all.

Donna, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

Oh, gosh,,,Buckle up -it’s a LONG story! I started out as a student of the Dreyfoos School of the Arts in Palm Beach, Florida, Jason and I were friends and classmates, We have many mutual friends and we were…just friends. I moved to NYC in pursuit of my studies and career in the Textile Industry at the Fashion Institute of Technology (SUNY).

I worked for the Mohair Council of America. A not-for-profit organization that markets Mohair to the fashion, home, and textile industry in New York City. We would invite fashion designers to visit the Texas Hill Country and romance them with the beauty of the fiber. I fell in love with Texas and the people and vowed that if I ever had an opportunity to move here, I would.

While at the Mohair Council of America’s NYC office, I was able to pursue working freelance for fashion designers as a color forecaster. My passion for color forecasting led me to move to Alexandria, VA to work for Nordstrom’s East Coast Division as a full time Director of Color Forecasting. This allowed me to focus on my passion -color trends.

Fast forward to Post 9/11 and I moved back to South Florida. I switched gears to further my Education from Florida Atlantic University (FAU) and earned a BA in English Literature. I feel like the lesson when switching gears or focus is not to lose your passion or love for something. When you switch gears, you just pivot to change with where you are at, during that time. A career in art is not linear.

The short story about South Florida is that Jason and I bumped into each other, got married, I worked as a Social Media Marketing Manager and Ghost writer for small businesses in a variety of fields (law, home remediation, yoga products, Jewish gifts, med spas, online fashion daily websites), and teaching allowed me to build our family.

I also love to renovate homes. The opportunity arose in 2018 to visit Austin with my family and we all agreed this would be our next stop. I found an ugly home to renovate and moved to Austin in September of 2019. I renovated our home and build an art studio for Jason. My husband and our son moved to Austin in March of 2020,

As the Owner of BrunkyArt, I do all of the financials, logistics, website, marketing, managing artwork for galleries, memberships, booking events, matting artwork, designing the booth spaces and appearance for BrunkyArt, and I am constantly trying to streamline how we vend and bettering our business for our customers.

What do you think helped you build your reputation within your market?

Knowing exactly what I want our business to look like has helped me build our reputation within the art market. I want BrunkyArt to be in every home in Austin -from a sticker on a Yeti cup to a beautiful painting or woodcut relief print. I want to have a streamlined, professional looking booth at every vending market we attend, I want price points that are attainable. Art should not be precious -it should be loved by all and every age,

I align our business with local companies that support all. We are never political but we do support the LGBT communities because that is important to us. We also support local animal rescue organizations,
Jason and I have both felt so supported in our start and we enjoy sharing what has worked for us with other emerging artists in our community.

How’d you meet your business partner?

Jason is the Artist for BrunkyArt and my husband of nearly 20 years. We met in high school when we were 14 and 15 years old. We were friends and had many mutual friends. We went in opposite directions -I went to NYC Fashion Institute of Technology and Jason went to MICA in Baltimore. About 7 years later, we both found ourselves back in South Florida. Our mutual friends were getting together. I took one look at Jason and just knew I would marry him. We got married in 2005.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.brunky.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brunkyart/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/BrunkyArt/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/BrunkyArt
• Other: https://vibeartisanmarkets.com/artisan/brunky-art/ https://printaustin.org/member-directory/#!biz/id/62d0362ab4c20609912e7247

Image Credits
Photo by Donna Wallerstein