Day 12/100: Anna Edwards and Kelly Rozwadowski
Encouraging Two Artists Who Won't Let the Myth of Perfection Stop Them
Today, I am celebrating Anna Edwards and Kelly Rozwadowski. Both of these artists understand that waiting for the perfect moment or demanding perfect outcomes can squeeze the joy out of their creative practices.
I’m thrilled that they will both be joining me in the online show, Square Foot Show: In Bloom with Debbie Miller & Friends, that starts on March 30, 2022.
Anna Edwards
Anna Edwards was born in Gainesville, Georgia and raised in the rural parts of northern Florida. Currently, she calls Tampa home.
From an early age, Anna loved all types of creative endeavor, especially painting. So much so that her grandmother and friends invited her to join them in painting classes when she was a teen. I’m sure she learned plenty (and some of it about art) from time spent with those ladies!
But motherhood and being a military wife meant that her creativity was channeled into more practical areas for many years: sewing, crochet, gardening and decorating. Now, she has circled back to painting, primarily in acrylic and mixed media.
Though Anna’s children are grown, she’s a caregiver for her husband, a Marine, who was grievously wounded in Afghanistan. Creating art feels like “the loveliest time of meditation” for her. She’s passionate about wanting others to experience that feeling of peace and possibility, too.
If someone isn’t comfortable with their own creative expression, Anna hopes that her work exudes those hopeful emotions to her viewers.
She’s always thought that she had an artist’s soul — in fact, she sees possible paintings everywhere that she looks. But it is only recently that she has gained confidence to overcome perfectionism (heeding her husband’s frequent advice: "Don't let the perfect become the enemy of the good!"). Now she is willing to call herself an artist. And right, she is!
Kelly Rozwadowski
When I met Kelly Rozwadowski a few years, I was instantly impressed by how she lit up a room and by the myriad ways that she uses her creative energies to educate, serve, heal, and inspire others.
She was born and raised in a close-knit suburban community in New Jersey and currently makes her home in the quieter, rural environment of Culpepper, Virginia. There, her graphic design studio supports merchants in the historic town center, as well as the tourism department and economic development initiatives. She finds it exciting to see the materials that she designs all around town.
Kelly also offers art classes in her studio and through the local parks and rec department. And if that wasn’t enough, Kelly teaches 8 classes of fitness and yoga each week — at a medically integrated gym and through parks and rec. She finds it really gratifying to help people have fun while they are exercising.
Oh, and did I mention…she also pursues her own fine arts passion. Originally, Kelly worked mostly with pastels and pencils. Even though she took some painting electives in college, she never had any instruction in the nuts and bolts of painting, and she felt so lost with a brush. She says that she completed all of her collegiate painting assignments with pastels!
Around 2008, she started to catch the painting bug when she learned a technique of making quick watercolor underpaintings for her pastel drawings. But it wasn’t until she studied under Melanie Morris in 2016, that someone helped teach her how to paint.
It was at this workshop that Brian Miller and I first encountered Kelly, and she was interested in our stories about our experience with daily painting. Since then, Kelly has progressively made more paintings than she did the year before. Now she’s making about 100 paintings a year, in various sizes.
Though she would always have described herself as artistic, because she was so interested in art, she didn’t feel like she had earned the job title of artist. Her graphic design business consumes a lot of time, often not leaving much creative energy for her own paintings. But teaching art has helped her to own the idea of being an artist. She knows that if she wants to encourage and instill confidence in her students, she needs to be willing to “walk the the walk” and be brave herself!
Kelly knows that when people say “you’re so talented,” they intend it as a compliment. But she experiences art as a continuous learning process — a series of marks and corrections — and she firmly believes that anyone can develop these skills if they have a sincere love for it and a willingness to practice. For example, while she has an intuitive sense of color, that intuition has been honed by her willingness to practice color mixing and study color theory.
How You Can Be an Encouragement
Please check out Anna and Kelly’s work on social media, follow them, and send them notes of encouragement today.
Also, you can purchase some of their floral work at great prices at the Square Foot Show: In Bloom with Debbie Miller and Friends, starting March 30, 2022 through April 1, 2022.
Anna Edwards:
On Instagram: @ae.creates
Website: Daily Paintworks Gallery
Kelly Rozwadowski:
On Instagram: @kellyroz.art
Etsy shop: KellyRoz