About Kris Cahill

Kris Cahill was born in 1958 in Chicago, and lives and works in Decatur GA. After earning a BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (1982), Kris made fashion, wearable art, costumes, hand painted and dyed fabrics, soft sculpture, and abstract paintings, which is what she focuses on now as an artist. Color, texture, and energy are Kris’s main inspirations and motivation for her art.

As an artist, Kris has worked as a fashion designer, costume designer for dance and theater, photo stylist, set designer for film, art teacher, textile designer, and painter.

Kris realized she was an abstract painter at heart while visiting the Gerhard Richter show at the MCA in Chicago in 1988. While walking around the show, Kris had a deep emotional response to the art, a sense memory or knowing of what art could be and do. She knew she wanted to make abstract paintings that had the power to connect with the viewer on an emotional level. 

Kris’s work is about the spiritual and emotional communication and connection, the unseen things that don’t need to make sense. This is not about analyzing the experience one is having, it’s about having the experience, and for each person to have their own unique personal experience, to have the permission and space to take from the work what they will.

Kris’s art influences include Marc Chagall, Gerhard Richter, Frida Kahlo, Bisa Butler, John Heartfield, Hans Hofmann, Kehinde Wiley, Maira Kalman, Nick Cave, David Hockney, Remedios Varo, Alma Thomas, Kerry James Marshall, and so many more. Kris is also influenced by the work of many writers, filmmakers, performers, and musicians, and is grateful to live in a time when it’s more possible than ever for every creative person to express themselves and share their work. Kris believes that life is art, and we each have the ability to be an artist.

Kris’s work includes themes of humor, feminism, imagination, democracy, healing, magic, stories, and connections. She enjoys writing short story descriptions of many of her paintings, which can be seen at her website, KrisCahillArt.com.