The Art Barn - About the Artist

“It’s all about bringing a moment of joy to people’s lives… whether it’s the smile that comes across their face when they look at a drawing of their favorite animal, or the tear in their eye when they view a portrait of their loved one."

Cindy Farmer

Cindy was born in Canton, Ohio and began her art career in high school taking a commercial art course and doing freelance art work for teachers, friends, etc.

She won a scholarship to the Columbus College of Art and Design.

"Self-Portrait".................Pastel

Carrie - color pencil portrait
"Carrie"........color pencil

After working six years as senior artist for the Ohio Bell Telephone Company, she started doing portraits and other freelance work at home in order to be with her 3 young boys.

Over the years, Cindy has done many commissioned portraits and wildlife paintings, has taught drawing classes, and has won numerous awards.

Her largest project has been a collection of over 375 pen and ink show dog illustrations that are available nationally as reproductions on mugs, T-shirts, note cards, and many other products.

Working with pen and ink is time consuming and takes a steady hand. Cindy uses an old-fashioned fine point ink pen dipped into a bottle of india ink. She strives for realism and detail in her designs, capturing the personality or character of the subject. She follows up the finished ink drawing by applying soft, transparent layers of color pencil over the design.

Drawing with prismacolor pencils allows for very fine detail in a portrait or drawing, where as pastel produces a more vibrant and painterly effect. Cindy works in layers with these two mediums, and particularly likes using a composite design or super-imposed images. The coloring can sometimes be very soft and subtle, somewhat like a ghost image and other times more bold and eye-catching.

Critics have described Cindy's work as highly realistic and detailed, seeming to magically capture the attitude or mood of the subject.

Russ, Ben and Jeff - color pencil portrait
"Russ, Ben, and Jeff"......color pencil

Intelligence Beyond - pastel (spirit series)
"Intelligence Beyond"......pastel
(See the Wildlife Gallery)

Cindy’s subject matter has been mostly animals, dog breeds, wildlife and portraits....
.....until recently.

Her art work has taken a new direction of a more inspiring, spiritual and thought-provoking nature.. The “Spirit” series was completed in 2005.

The new “Exploring Consciousness” project, completed in 2006, is twelve pieces, designed with layered images, word graphics and geometric symbols.

This is a traveling exhibit that symbolically asks the questions that everyone wants answers to....
Who are we? Where do we come from? What is our purpose here?

Traveling Exhibit
(Exploring Life, Spirituality and Higher Consciousness Through Art)

Cindy’s personal life has been changing too, coming back full circle to the ideas from the 60’s and 70’s of self-sufficiency, living in harmony with the earth, etc. She is a co-founder of Earth Song Farm.... a combination alternative energy home/ organic farm/ educational/ spiritual and healing center in the Lodi - Medina, Ohio area... (www.earthsongfarm.com).

Cindy currently teaches Tai Chi, Qi-Gong, stretching and body awareness, guided meditation and raw-food nutrition. She is also a practitioner of “Reconnective” healing, tuning fork sound frequency healing, and various other healing modalities.

“My hope is that through my art work, I might make a difference... encouraging people to think and become more aware of life, consciousness, taking care of the earth, helping each other, energy healing, spirituality, etc....to see the bigger picture.”

The Art Barn Studio
2559 Summit Rd.
Copley, Ohio 44321
phone: 330-524-7138

email: artbarn_cfarmer@hotmail.com