Artist on the Rise: Kellie Enderson

The vision to see something new in the everyday is a feat many amongst us haven’t had the skill—or perhaps the patience—to attain. It happens to be at the center of one recently graduated local artist’s craft, rooted in the nuance of the human figure.

Kellie Enderson

Augustana University grad Kellie Enderson’s entry point to creating art wasn’t immediately putting pencil to paper—it was a craving for storytelling.

“When I was a kid I was a total and complete bookworm,” she said. “I was reading constantly. Just interested in reading stories and experiencing stories. I slowly had the realization that I could make stuff, too.”

Her love of reading morphed into a love of creating characters, and throughout middle and high school, Enderson found herself inspired by the work of anime artists. “I think it was a really accessible way of getting into art,” she said of dabbling in how-to-draw books and posting work online. “That’s how I started and then slowly drifted into a more naturalistic style. I’m still mainly focused on drawing people, even today.”

During her time as an art major at Augustana, Enderson was inspired by the work of mentors like Scott Parsons in the drawing realm and Lindsay Twa in the lithography space. “Even just the community of printmakers around Augie is a big inspiration to keep going.”

Art developed a place in Enderson’s life as both a practice and a mechanism for wellness. Seeing drawing as a way to learn and understand the world around her, she began to see it as an avenue for wellbeing, as well as expression.

“Being able to do art kind of opens up a pathway for communicating with the world,” she said. “I think there’s something intrinsic with humans with creating—you go back to the Stone Age and they were painting on cave walls and making figures, even back before there was a settled society.

“I think it’s just an important part of human nature to be able to create in the way you see fit.”

The work Enderson undertook at Augustana culminated in the university’s recent senior exhibition, which included pieces from across the graduating class of artists in the Eide/Dalrymple Gallery on campus.

“I think almost everything in there had some kind of figure along with it,” she said of her contributed pieces. “A lot of my pieces are really hand-forward for whatever reason.”

The artist also experienced the unavoidable and global impact of the COVID-19 pandemic while creating her pieces, something that she saw influencing a great deal of the senior works.

“Like many people who experienced the pandemic and the emotions of that, I think every artist had some kind of piece to deal with the feelings of that,” she said. “It was such a universal thing.

“I’m interested in, especially drawing from life, seeing and understanding the world around me through drawing. How things are shaped. The form of things through seeing them and drawing them down.”

Since wrapping her senior showcase and walking across the graduation stage, Enderson has her sights set on remaining in the Sioux Falls area, making use of her other major, computer information systems, while continuing to build her portfolio in her spare time.

“Between balancing other classes and activities and the amount of time each print takes to make, I don’t have a huge body of work yet,” she said. “I’d like to just continue to grow my portfolio through working in the studio and see where that takes me.”

In addition to making, Enderson hopes to impart some of what she’s learned on other incoming students while staying a presence in Augustana’s printmaking studio. Challenging oneself and trying something a little scary or unfamiliar is something she saw great value in as a burgeoning artist.

“I’d really encourage students to go out there, experience a little bit of everything,” she said. “Take classes or mediums you maybe had never even tried or didn’t like as much. You really don’t know where you’re going to end up in terms of art until you put yourself out there a little more.

“Don’t be afraid to make what you want to make. That’s what comes out in the end as being the most genuine and what people generally end up responding to the most.”