Shawna L. Handke is a Kansas native who has found herself a long way from home. She currently resides in Boston, where she creates paintings and drawings, using acrylic, gouache, watercolor, and ink. She is inspired by snapshots of everyday life, documented through the lens of her camera and in the pages of her numerous sketchbooks. As she presumes that hands and feet reflect people’s occupations, thoughts, or emotions, many of her compositions are based on human anatomy. She has also decided to take social responsibility to care for the environment and expresses this concern through her use of many recycled materials. Recently, she has created an entire collection, Scribbles—Sketches, which is dedicated to her environmental concerns. These are drawings that are created on paper that would have otherwise been discarded. Overall, her artwork is an immediate reflection of her life and her interpretation of others’ lives.

Handke received her Bachelor of Arts in Painting at the University of Nebraska at Omaha in 2003. Handke has been pursuing various avenues to display her work both locally and globally. Her artwork is currently on display in a gallery in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, and she has an exhibition scheduled for June 2008 in New York City. Her work is also included in several private collections across the United States and in Europe. She anticipates seeing where her art will take her next.
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