By Bonnie Gangelhoff
In 1999, Karmel Timmons moved to a ranching community near Elbert, CO, southeast of Denver, and purchased four quarter horses. For Timmons, it was a life-changing experience. Since early childhood she had always loved to draw, and soon she began rendering her new equines in pencil.
Not long after that, a neighbor commissioned her to draw the horses on her ranch. Within months, Timmons was stacking up numerous requests for western-flavored drawings. She was so successful, in fact, that a year later, in 2000, she was able to quit her office job to pursue a full-time career in fine art. “I’m mainly trying to capture the beauty of the horse and the rider,” Timmons says. “I like to express the relationship between them.”
Today, horses continue to inspire her. The artist has become known for her talent in portraying details, textures, and moods. “I want my horses to look real, so that people can feel as if they can almost touch them,” Timmons says.
In 2004 and 2005, she received the People’s Choice award at the Coors Western Art Exhibit and Sale in Denver. This month, she is a participating artist in the Stampede Western Invitational Art Exhibit & Sale held annually in Greeley, CO, and in July her work is on view in an auction at Altermann Galleries in Santa Fe, NM, where she also is represented.
Featured in “Artists to Watch” June 2006