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

Jennifer, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. We’d love to hear the backstory behind a risk you’ve taken – whether big or small, walk us through what it was like and how it ultimately turned out.

My life has been full of unexpected twists and turns, risks that I had to take because there was no other choice but to sink or swim and risks I fully jumped into. For example about 12 years ago I was faced with a husband leaving me and our three children. I was a stay at home mom and had not had an official job in 13 years. Instead of taking a normal job… I started a full time art career and opened an art gallery. Not only did I not sink… I thrived swimming in the art pool. The eve-N-odd was a wild success and I thoroughly enjoyed being a full time artist and gallery owner.
When my 4th child was born–I closed the gallery and worked from home as an artist and muralist.
Sometimes the trials in life… the little dips and turns that are quite unexpected leave us to some beautiful opportunities and the challenges become our lives’ greatest works.
This past February–I sold my home in St. Petersburg, FL, left an established art career as a street art muralist, fine artist and fiber artist to live out my life long dream to live in Alaska. I have bought a home here and will begin to establish myself in a totally different place.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

I have always been an artist. I was born to create. My work is meant to bring people together to tell a story to each other and to connect lives and emotions. Whimsical and colorful at first glance–my work is about creating a feeling. My buyers and collectors buy the pieces and hire me to do a mural because they understand and feel a kinship to my raw emotion. I am an interpreter and medium in which emotions flow. I only paint and draw from my life and experiences. Given that we are all human–my life is like your life and in some ways we all overlap. When I make original art, unique dolls, embroideries, murals… people like them because they feel the same way on some level. From joy to depression–I paint all life experiences through whimsical, colorful and childlike personal symbols or characters.
Out of anything else I prize being unique. If you own a hand painted purse by me–no one else in the world will have that purse. In a world of sheeple… be someone who is a little different. I value the handmade, the one of a kind. With that said I also make limited edition tees and stickers.
I am most proud of my freestyle street art murals that I have completed. I have many murals in Florida and I hope to do more in Alaska.
You can find my work and my journey from FL to AK on my tiktok and Instagram: Both are @kosharekart

What can society do to ensure an environment that’s helpful to artists and creatives?

The best thing you can do to support an artist is to buy their work. Wear their tees. Give them shout outs on your social media accounts. Tell your friends.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

Being a female street artist of a certain age has its benefits and its drawbacks. Street art 13 years ago was a hard field to break into. I have always felt like an outsider. I have always felt like it was a boys club. If you are young, hot and in a bikini–you are accepted as a female in the business. But if you aren’t sporting that bikini you aren’t given a place in the genre. So I had to make my own way, on my own and just push forward without a group of artists having my back. I resented that for years but, then I realized that I could empower the women who came after me–especially teens. So I wrote my own playbook and I made a way, a path for others. In the end–the men who snubbed me–ended up respecting me. It was not an easy path but, if that was how I was going to do what I love… then that’s the way I worked it.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.kosharekart.art
• Instagram: @kosharekart
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/evenoddgallery
• Other: tiktok: @kosharekart

Image Credits
Jennifer Kosharek