About the Artist

Goodness ... Truth ... Beauty

Biography

Karen Vernon is a Texas-based contemporary American painter whose career encompasses four decades of painting, arts education, and cultural leadership. Working in oil, watercolor, pastel, and acrylic, she creates luminous landscapes, florals, and still lifes that explore the relationship between light, atmosphere, and the human experience.

The visual force of light reveals the resilience and possibilities of nature and our everyday surroundings. At the center of Vernon’s practice is a commitment to investigation of light, shadow and atmosphere. Through expressive color, subtle temperature transitions, and edges that emerge and dissolve, she creates an atmosphere that connects each subject to its surroundings. Her paintings invite extended inspection, revealing beauty in the complexity, imperfection, and transience of ordinary life. Her work reflects an enduring belief in art’s capacity to nurture attention span and critical thinking skills, deepen human connection, and make beauty a meaningful presence in everyday life.

Texas is unique with its open pastures and expansive skies, coastal fishing villages, mountains and canyons, deserts, and lush subtropical landscapes. She is drawn to these vanishing environments by an awareness of their vulnerability to environmental change, development, infrastructure, and technological expansion which reshapes the land. Each work becomes a record of time: a place observed, experienced, and remembered.

Her paintings are part of national and international collections including The Museum at Chateau de Vullievens, Switzerland, Corpus Christi Museum, and the collection at the University of North Texas.  Her works are included in notable corporate and private collections in the United States and abroad.

Vernon was one of fifty artists—and one of only three watercolorists—selected to represent Texas for the national traveling museum exhibition Sea to Shining Sea, an exhibition created to honor the United States after 911. She holds signature memberships in several distinguished watercolor societies and has been listed in Who’s Who in American Art, Strathmore’s Who’s Who,  and Who’s Who in America. Her professional experience also includes seventeen years as a gallerist in Miami, Florida, and Round Top, Texas, bringing a broad perspective to her work as an artist, educator, and advocate.

Vernon’s commitment to the arts extends well beyond her own studio. Based in Brenham, as an instructor and juror, she has shared her knowledge nationally with artists for more than forty years, teaching painting as well as art business and marketing. She has an impressive list of inventions such as Aquabord and the Vernon Shader and a history of international demonstrations for recognized fine art supply manufacturers. Vernon founded ACT, Artists Changing Tomorrow, and continues her dedication to arts development as a founder and vice-president of Studio Texas, a nonprofit supporting education, professional growth, and connections among artists, collectors, and communities. She brings together a nationally established career and a deep commitment to the cultural life of Texas.

Artist's Statement

It has been years of work and play, exploring how light moves and wraps itself around objects.  There has always been the quest to understand the "magic" that captures me.  I really love to work on a large scale.  Painting large allows me to get up close and provides a better space to create the strong impact I often experience in subjects I paint.

Each story seems to call for a different medium. While some look for a unified body of work, I delight in the exploration of each subject and each medium.  Sometimes I will explore an image in different media, striving to find the best expression for the piece.

Here, a journey begins through the many years of learning, discovering, making mistakes, rethinking, and breaking down barriers about what watercolor can be, how an experience can be spoken visually. As a watercolorist it has been a long journey. I started studying the medium at the age of 7. Playing in the flow of color has always been a delight.

I discovered the joy of painting light, capturing the essence of how color and surface alter as light moves in time. For years, I worked in the flow of water and color, allowing the pigment to manage itself and honoring the purity of the medium. In recent years, I have returned to pastel and oil, media studied while I was a child. I have been drawn to the intimacy of the strike of the brush and the stick against the surface and delight in the interaction.\

I have been fortunate and have had many of my works land in wonderful private, corporate, and museum collections.  I have learned so much from my students and am so thankful to have been allowed to time to explore.

Resume

Karen Vernon, ACT, BWS, TWS, WAS-H (ACT - Artists Changing Tomorrow, BWS – Birmingham Watercolour Society, TWS – Texas Watercolor Society, WAS-H – Watercolor Art Society – Houston)

Contemporary American Painter

Brenham, Texas

www.karenvernon.com | [email protected] | 305.389.9748

Arts Leadership

2024–present | Founder and Vice President, Studio Texas (www.studiotexas.org)

2023–2024 | Executive Director, American Women Artists (https://americanwomenartists.org/)

2018–2023 | Executive Director, Arts for Rural Texas (https://www.artsforruraltexas.org/

2010 – 2016 | Founder and Curator, Artists Changing Tomorrow International Invitational, a fundraising program for arts nonprofit organizations

2009- 2016 | ARTS – Board of Directors, President 2012 & 2013

Watercolor Art Society Houston – Houston, TX – Board of Directors

Texas Pioneer Arts Foundation – Kerrville, TX - Board of Directors

Professional Contributions

Ampersand Art Supply
Thirty-seven-year collaboration in the research, development, testing, and promotion of Aquabord®, contributing to one of the first archival watercolor painting surfaces designed for exhibition without glass.

Holbein Artist Materials
Collaborated in the design and development of professional watercolor brushes for fine artists.

Watercolor Monotype Innovation
Developed one of the first archival processes for creating watercolor monotypes, expanding the possibilities of contemporary water media printmaking.

Selected Museum and Corporate Collections

• Château de Vullierens Museum, Morges in Vaud, Switzerland
• Corpus Christi Museum, Corpus Christi, TX
• City of Crete, Crete, IL
• The National PGA Headquarters, Jacksonville, FL
• Walt Disney Corporation, Orlando, FL
• Amoco Corporation, Chicago, IL
• Delta Airlines, Orlando, FL
• Moody Gardens Resort Hotel, Galveston, TX
• PetroSource, Houston, TX
• Techmatics, Fairfax, VA
• ECPI of Tidewater, Tidewater, VA
• Ampersand Art Supply, Buda, TX
• University of North Texas, Denton, TX

Selected Invitational Exhibitions

Sea to Shining Sea, A Three-Year National Museum Touring Exhibition celebrating the United States Post 911

Selected Juried Exhibitions

Women in Watercolor, International Competition *

Texas Watercolor Society Annual Competition *

Watercolor Art Society- Houston, International Competition *

Washington County Fair 2006 Grand Champion & four First Place Awards– Fine Art Adult Division

UART National Pastel Competition 2016

Watermedia 2003

Pastel Society of Southeast Texas International Competition 2016, 2017*

National Plein Air Competition, Miami, FL *

Watermedia, Florida Watercolor Society Exhibition*

Watermedia Challenge of Champions Exhibition, Houston, TX*

WAS-H International Exhibition 2003+, Houston, TX*

Corsicana National Juried Exhibition, Corsicana, TX *

Dimensions XIV, Houston, TX*

Selected Publications and Media

“Unleashing Dynamic Color”, Featured Artist, Video by Ampersand Art Supply, Austin, TX

“The Art of Monotype”, Featured Artist, Video by Beverly and Harvey Fredricks, Los Angeles, CA

PBS Video, “Vernon Retrospective”, PBS Columbus, SC

Featured in Different Strokes – Watercolor by Naomi Tydeman, Walter Foster

Featured in The Watercolor Flower Artist’s Bible edited by Claire Waite Brown, Chartwell Books, Inc.

Featured in How to Paint Watercolor Flowers by Robin Berry, Readers Digest Association, Inc. 2010

Featured in Must Paint Watercolour Flowers

Featured in Watercolors Stroke to Stroke, Quarto Publishing

Featured in Painting in Watercolor, The Indispensable Guide  by David Webb, Firefly, 2006

Featured in Scratchboard Techniques by Charles Ewing

American Artist Magazine, 1988. 1989, 2004

Luxury Homes of Washington, “A Matter of Time”

Metropolitan Woman, Cover

Tallascope, Cover, June – August 1993

Collections

Royal Family of Saudi Arabia

Congressman and Alta Leath

Dan and Claire Marino, Miami, FL

The City of Crete, IL

John Dasberg, Miami, FL

The Vining Beall Collection, Columbus, TX

Teaching

Paperworld Demonstrator, Frankfurt, Germany

Boesner’s, Germany

Daniel Smith, Washington

Florida Watercolor Society

Oregon Watercolor Society

Artisan Expo+. Santa Fe, New Mexico

Art of the Americas, Burlington, Vermont

Toronto Watercolor Society, Canada

Art of the Carolinas, Raleigh, NC (20 years)

Methods and Materials Show, Pasadena, CA  (Over a decade)

Learning and Products Show, Burbank & Pasadena, CA, Chicago, IL, Washington DC

Regional and Community Organizations in Arkansas, California, Florida, Indiana, Kansas, Louisiana, Nebraska, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oregon, Texas, Washington, and Canada

Competition/Exhibition Judge

Texas Watercolor Society

Lone Star Art Guild

Miami Watercolor Society

Pastel Society of Southeast Texas

Portland Watercolor Society

Tabletop International

Tomball Art League

Brenham Fine Arts League

Additional information upon request

Gallery Owner & Director

The Gallery at Round Top, Round Top, TX
Comforts Gallery, Round Top, TX
Coconut Grove Gallery, Coconut Grove, FL

Easy Street Gallery, Corpus Christi, TX

Awards

Women in Watercolor International Competition 2020 – 2^nd Place Landscape and Water, 2 Honorable Mentions

Pastel Society of Southeast Texas International Competition 2018 – First Place

UArt National Pastel Competition - 2019

Texas Watercolor Society Exhibition

National Plein Aire Competition, Miami, FL

Watermedia Florida Watercolor Society Exhibition

Watermedia, Challenge of Champions Exhibition

WAS-H International Exhibition, Houston, TX

Corsicana National Juried Exhibition, Corsicana, TX

Dimensions XIV,  Houston, TX

Miami Herald’s Scenes from South Florida, Miami, FL

Selected Career Highlights

• Forty-eight years as a professional artist
• Museum, corporate, and private collections worldwide
• Seventeen years as gallery owner/director
• Thirty-seven-year collaboration with Ampersand Art Supply
• Holbein professional brush design collaborator
• Developed an archival watercolor monotype process
• Founder, Artists Changing Tomorrow
• Executive Director, Arts for Rural Texas
• Executive Director, American Women Artists
• Founder and Officer, Studio Texas
• Art business seminar instructor/speaker and consultant
• National and international lecturer, juror, and educator