Born and raised in Kansas City, Missouri, local artist Vanessa Violet has set up a home studio to continue her lifelong passion of art and nature. Her fondest childhood memories are going out into the local woodland areas and exploring them. She loved birds the most, making crayon drawings of each one once back home and scouring over her father’s field guides until she could identify what bird species she saw. She loved the detailed illustrations from the guides and from old botanical illustrations. Her art pays close attention to anatomy but uses linework that is course and textured focusing more on expression and how the appearance changes at different view points and less on photo-realism.