Artist Reception: Renee Wilkie | Guiart: Creating Peace, One Piece at a Time

Artist Reception | Friday, September 29 | 5:30PM
Free Admission

Join us as we celebrate this amazing exhibition with refreshments and live music! This will be an outdoor/indoor event.

Local self-taught artist Renee Wilkie of Cedar Falls designed and crafted these mosaic-encrusted guitars, fueled by the joy found in creating. “Being an artist is our natural state – hand any 3-year-old art supplies and they will show you. As we grow older, some of us forget how to play, constantly comparing (to others) at the cost of losing joy in the creativity,” explains Renee. She lost her desire to make art in the traditional sense back in high school. It has taken her a long time to heal from this feeling that “she wasn’t good enough.” Renee rediscovered the joy of art and is making up for lost time. She may not have gone to art school, but she has relearned to play and experiment with many mediums, mastering none (in her estimation), but loving them all.

Thirty-five years ago, Renee took a stained glass class from a local shop, John Dutcher Glass & Paint, and developed a passion for the medium and material. After years of creating and tuning her craft, she began sharing her experience and skills in teaching adult education classes through Hawkeye Community College.

Renee has made many windows and other stained glass works. Eventually, she needed to do something with all of her “scraps”. She started with stepping stones for her garden, which led to mosaic garden art sculptures and then to giving new life to guitars. Renee has produced over 40 “GuiArt” pieces at this point.

Renee creates for the pure joy of creating. It’s contemplative, prayerful, and healing for her. In her words, “She’s creating peace, one piece at a time.”