Kathleen Strukoff began painting beautiful vistas as a 12-year-old in New Mexico. Today, she’s a well-respected artist with a studio in Palm Springs’ Backstreet Art District.
She attained her master’s degree in business administration at the University of New Mexico. Strukoff often visited her mother in Cathedral City, and in 2020, she moved with her husband to Palm Springs because she “fell in love with the vibe and the scenery. It felt to me like a place that embraced creatives.”
Her studio is in the back of Kee Gallery, which Strukoff co-owns with fellow artists Ernesto Ramirez and Erich Meager; the first letters of each of their names gives the gallery its name.
“In November, we are going to have a special show ‘11 Artists on 111’ to celebrate our one-year anniversary,” she said. “We are doing this to support the artist community and not charging the artists, but asking them to donate a portion of any sales to the middle school art program at Desert Art Center.”
Giving back to the educational community is important to Strukoff. Painting Palm Springs’ midcentury-modern architecture is one of Strukoff’s favorite things to do, so it’s appropriate that for the past two years, Strukoff has been involved with the Palm Springs Modernism Committee, visiting schools and revealing the symmetry between art, design and architecture as part of PS ModCom’s Building Educational Architectural Models (BEAM) curriculum.
“In 2024, PS ModCom awarded scholarships to four Palm Springs Unified School District students at a $2,500 scholarship per year named in honor of Robert Imber, an architectural historian and founding member of PS ModCom, who initiated the organization’s college scholarship program,” said Joan Gand, the chair of PS ModCom’s Education Committee. “Kathleen is part of a team of two volunteer teachers who kick off the program by presenting a three-day class to art students about architecture, design and modernism. This introduces the students to another world, in most cases, that they never knew existed.”
Strukoff said she’s always amazed at how creative the students become in building their models. She also enjoys watching “the evolution of some of the students who get so excited about design and architecture, they want to go to college and pursue that avenue,” she said.
She also enjoys teaching these students about painting.
“Sometimes I do a little painting class with the students to help them on a project, and it’s magical to see what that does,” she said. “… It’s also way for me to give back in a small way with my artistic talents. Some of the students even create little paintings to put on the walls of the house they design. The program takes place mostly in the art classes, so they are art-oriented young people.”
Strukoff’s architectural paintings feature magical representations of iconic Palm Springs houses and buildings, featuring a sense of color with gorgeous light. She said she’s sometimes commissioned to make a painting of a private home.
“Often, those are surprises for a spouse’s birthday or special occasion, so I am participating in a stealth operation, including ‘stalking’ their house to get pictures that I can use of their house to create the painting,” she said. “I had one client who was distracting her wife while I was skulking around the yard to take photos.”
Strukoff is the artist-in-residence for the Palm Springs Vintage Market, which takes place the first Sunday of the month from October through May.
“Little paintings there capture the community of that scene,” she said. “As a colorist, I always push the color a bit and almost never paint a blue sky, but instead use a different color that conveys a mood. People tell me that I capture a place and time that usually creates an emotional reaction for them. Some will tell me that the way I use color makes them be able to smell and feel being at that place.”
A natural educator, Strukoff also teaches classes at her gallery and at The Springs clubhouse in Rancho Mirage.
“It is so exciting to see how different everyone’s end result is when we are painting the same scene—and I want them to embrace that individuality,” Strukoff said.
Learn more at kathleenstrukoff.com.
Great to know about Kathleen, her gallery, and the work being done in the field of Art, Design, and Architecture with our young people who are so eager to absorb the learning and experiences.