Walk into artist Lisa Kinzelberg’s Winnetka home studio and you’ll see several paintings in progress. Large-scale abstracts, figurative works, and portraits encircle the room. One, a portrait of Kinzelberg reading to her children, leans against the western wall. Paint tubes and brushes, palettes with daubs of mixed colors, cans of walnut oil, and other bits of painterly flotsam spread out underneath. Inches away, an American Girl sports car is parked next to a Barbie dream house. Twists of Hot Wheels race tracks trail off toward a partiallybuilt Lego tower. A metal basket of soccer balls looms beyond that.
Lisa Kinzelberg seated in front of Compose, 30 x 60 inches, oil on canvas, created using a special “action-painting” technique that, according to Kinzelberg, feels like conducting an orchestra or composing notes of a tune. PHOTOGRAPHY BY MONICA KASS ROGERS
This unintentional still life combining children’s play things and serious paintings, “exactly represents my life,” laughs Kinzelberg.
When her children (Livvie, age 8 and Eli, age 10) are home, Kinzelberg is with them, momming the home ship with all its attendant games and books, meals and cleaning, sports, and homework. But when the kids are at school, eLearing, or at activities, she paints. A lot. In the last year Kinzelberg completed 14 paintings—12 of them commissioned for homes throughout the North Shore and in second homes in Arizona and Florida.
Blooms, 26 x 30 inches, oil on canvas, private commission for an Old World style living room in Winnetka, inspired by their adorable family (the title plays off of their last name) and the symbolism of lemon leaves. PHOTOGRAPHY BY ROB WARNER
Lake Dreams, 30 x 48 inches, also a private commission, created with the design challenge to complement—not compete—with the Persian rug that grounds the Ralph Lauren-style sitting room. PHOTOGRAPHY BY ROB WARNER
Two years ago, Kinzelberg—who has a degree in Philosophy of Art and Art History from The College of Wooster, Ohio, had been painting and drawing as a hobby, trying to decide whether she should jump back into a business career, or do something else.
Blooms, 26 x 30 inches, oil on canvas, private commission for an Old World style living room in Winnetka, inspired by their adorable family (the title plays off of their last name) and the symbolism of lemon leaves. PHOTOGRAPHY BY ROB WARNER
“When I came out of college, I didn’t want to be a starving artist, so I went into other work—first for a PR firm in Cleveland, and then for a management consulting firm in Chicago,” Kinzelberg recalls. “And then I stepped away from all that to raise a family. Once the children were both in school, I knew I wanted to do something to keep growing creatively. I was looking for that second act.”
Talking about this with a close friend in the interior design business, Jessica Margot Federighi of Jessica Margot Design in Lake Forest, who was also a fan of her work, brought Kinzelberg her first commission.
“Jessica had a client who needed a large piece of wall art in their family room,” Kinzelberg recalls, “and asked if I would be willing to create it. Jessica took a big risk referring me, but the result was fabulous. The client loved the work and I enjoyed the collaboration. So it was a win for everyone.”
Since that initial project, word of Kinzelberg’s work spread fast.
“Commissions are so much fun,” she says. “They have a built-in challenge because they are collaborative. I love giving the client a finished piece that is not only an expression of how I view things as an artist but something that is meaningful to them too.”
Growing up in Akron, Ohio, as the middle child in a family with three daughters, Kinzelberg developed that vision early. “I was captivated by all things visual,” she says. “When I was tiny, my mom recalls that I looked at the world differently than other toddlers, noticing and commenting on colors, proportions, scale, and texture. And I always found ways to communicate emotion in my drawings.”
Kinzelberg’s childhood was full of culture and intellectual conversations. Her stepfather had been a professor of history, and her mother’s family members were musicians. “My grandfather, for example, was the music director for the New Jersey State Opera, a composer, guest symphony conductor, and nationally recognized timpanist. He played snare drum with Benny Goodman and Paul Samuel Whiteman. And my uncle is also a prominent music director, composer, and drummer.”
In fact, Kinzelberg’s approach to painting, “is like drumming,” she says. “With a lot of emphasis on the rhythm and stroke, and energy. When I paint, I too focus on rhythm and movement, intentionally interrupting lines, sculpting the surface, and so forth to create tension and feeling.”
Most of Kinzelberg’s commissioned works are abstracts, which she creates by layering, removing, and re-layering paint. “It’s an iterative process,” she remarks. “I apply the paint, create a composition, and then start removing and reapplying the paint until an interesting color story and energy emerges. Even if it takes seven layers, I don’t stop until the piece feels alive.”
A lot of the paintings Kinzelberg has been commissioned to create are in newer homes. “So I feel it is important for the pieces to have a feeling of nature or history about them—water, stone, rock, sky … even brick. This way, they bring some soul and texture, story, and energy into the space.”
Post-COVID-19, Kinzelberg hopes to do more shows locally, nationally, and eventually internationally. She’s also exploring the stories she tells with her art. “The artists I respect most have a cogent approach to their work—their art and philosophy of life are one and the same. I want the pieces I create to resonate with the viewer so that they see something about their own existence in the work.”
For more information about Kinzelberg, visit lisakinzelbergart.com.
