Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Jennifer Harms. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Jennifer, appreciate you joining us today. Let’s start with the decision of whether to donate a percentage of sales to an organization or cause – we’d love to hear the backstory of how you thought through this.

I do not donate a percentage of sales for every purchase, however, there are some special projects where all of the proceeds go to a certain cause.

The first of these projects was a series of 5 outdoor themed paintings I did, and then in turn made them into a greeting card set. I lost my older brother 8 years ago. He was an active duty Air Force maintenance officer, and an outdoor enthusiast. Being 4 years my senior, being outside was one of the things we enjoyed doing together the most. Upon moving to Utah, I had a serendipitous moment on a ski lift where I met a volunteer for an organization that does veteran suicide prevention using outdoor recreation. I immediately knew I wanted the proceeds from my project honoring my brother to go towards this organization. Their name is Continue Mission and you can find out more about them at www.continuemission.org.

A second project where the proceeds go towards an organization, was a painting I did on the day Russia invaded Ukraine. As a military spouse, global events always hit close to home. It was a very heavy day with lots of emotions. As I was communicating with various women that day, one conversation in particular had me immediately putting paint to paper. She told me that she had once seen a painting, done by a child at a Bahrain art museum that was very heavy. She told me how happy she was that despite the many conflicts our country has been in, our kids can still draw rainbows and flowers. I did a piece of a mother holding her infant, while he stares at a patch of flowers. Meanwhile the mother holds up the night sky behind him. As a military spouse we are very often doing our best to keep anxiety and worry off the shoulders of our children while struggling with the heaviness ourselves. I couldn’t even imagine the women of Ukraine suddenly facing such atrocities and not knowing how best to keep their children safe. I have never seen such a profound reaction to one of my pieces on social media. I ended up selling the original piece and did 26 professional prints. All except 3 have sold and all proceeds have gone to Save the Children, an organization that is doing crisis relief work with Ukraine and has had boots on the ground since 2014.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I’m a military spouse, mother and adventure lover. ‘Brushwork Impressions’ is inspired by my belief that the timeless concept of kind gestures remains important. As a military spouse also raised in a military family, my mother bestowed on me the practice of gift giving. With a background in economic development, I always loved working with small businesses. Not only did they have immense amounts of passion for what they did, the stories for how they came to be were always so fascinating. I found myself constantly on the hunt for unique, beautiful and themed gifts for friends and family. After moving to Utah in 2019 I got back into art after years of ignoring my creative self because the beauty of this state was too much to ignore. Finally, in 2020, I decided to combine my love of business and my love of creative gift giving together and Brushwork Impressions was born.

My biggest seller is photo replication usually in the form of portraits either on a large art piece or even a small bookmark. I do house portraits, state themed greeting cards, and state themed custom duty station collections. I have started diving more and more into original art after my big jump with the Ukrainian fundraising piece and have seen an incredible response. My original pieces usually stem from my love of the outdoors, strong female themes and motherhood.

This past year I published a children’s book alongside my cousin that was inspired by our Grandfather and how we grew up. We are currently working on a categorized activity sheet for parents that is based on the book, and the development of a second book in the series is in the works.

I am most proud of the responses I get from clients for not only the pieces they receive, but the process. I try and make the process of a custom art piece as painless and as forthcoming as possible. I have an eye for detail, and try and keep in mind the things that will truly make a custom piece special. I am also proud of where I have come as an artist in a short amount of time. I took a long break from my creative self as I got my degree, started my career, got married and had my babies. Watching my children experience the world opened my eyes again to getting back to that part of me.

Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?

This has been and continues to be slow moving, however, the upticks in engagement continue to grow everyday. There are some key rules I have tried to focus on. First of all, if a business/blog/influencer account follows me, it doesn’t matter if they have 10 followers to 10,000, they will receive a followback from my business account. Appreciation is key in all matters, and especially business. If you are going to take the time to follow my account, your kindness will be reciprocated. Secondly, engagement with others. Why would you ever expect likes, comments, and brand loyalty if you aren’t willing to hand out compliments to others that you respect. I don’t view the creatives on social media as competition, but rather community. The world is big enough for every creative mind, and we are better for it. Through engagement, I have been able to truly get to know some of my followers. In turn they have become customers and I have also become customers of theirs. People like to support people, artists and brands that they feel like they know. Adding that level of intimacy has helped. Thirdly, I always try and respond to every comment on every post. Again, appreciation is key. If someone is going to take the time to comment on one of my posts, they are going to be thanked at the very least, and sometimes this turns into greater conversation points.

We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?

I wouldn’t say it was a lesson that had to be unlearned, but more of a state of being. My degree was in business, and my first job was the CEO of a Chamber of Commerce in Kansas. While school and my career added small areas where I could allow for creativity, it mostly created an environment for staying inside the lines, figuratively speaking. Even as a military spouse, there are expectations for you in behavior, etiquette, etc. Getting back into art, it was difficult at first and still is highly vulnerable to put myself out there in such a large way. The elements of worrying what your friends and associates may think as you experiment with different themes can be daunting. I have a close friend who has been building her business since we graduated college together and she simply told me one day, “you just have to paint what you want. And your customers will find you.” It was the best advice she could have told me, and putting myself into that mind set has helped me in my creative path.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://spouse-ly.com/store/brushwork-impressions
• Instagram: www.instagram.com/brushworkimpressions
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/brushworkimpressions