Art In Action: Ramseier Excels
By Darla McCammon and Dee Anna Muraski
Most of us had experience with art teachers, beginning with our elementary school education. Our new exhibiting artist for April through June is one whose students were very fortunate.
Brenda (Hunter) Ramseier is an excellent teacher. She instilled a love of art in her students but she is also an accomplished artist with a bounty of awards and recognition to her name. Ramseier is proficient in multiple mediums but currently enjoys pen and ink along with watercolor as her favorites. “The Old Barn” is a good example of the quality of her work. Staff at Warsaw City Hall Art Gallery are proud to bring the work of Ramseier to our community for you to enjoy. The work of Ramseier is exceptional and you will want to visit it when it opens April 4. A Hoosier native, she enjoys capturing farms, barns, trees, nature scenes and other beauty that is part of her heritage.
Ramseier has a healthy education that includes Bob Jones University, as well as Manchester and Purdue Universities, through which she received her teaching art credentials. This contributed greatly to her growth as an artist and teacher. Mentors who inspired her, and through whom she studied, have been Terry Armstrong, Gwen Gutwein, Henry Bell, and Rob O’Dell. Before retiring from Maconaquah School Corporation, she taught elementary and middle school art. But Ramseier is not one to remain idle. Over the last 25 years, she won many honors and continued her love for teaching by providing workshops and offering classes for both children and adults.
Among her large list of honors and awards include the prestigious Hoosier Salon, Honeywell Art Center, The Anderson Center for the Arts, Ventures in Creativity in Fort Wayne, LaFontaine Arts Council in Huntington, and the Akron Area Art League. Among the notable awards are several Best of Show entries and numerous first, second and third place awards. In 2014, she was named “Artist of the Year” by the Akron Area Arts League.
She was featured on “Arts IN Focus” on television through PBS39 in 2021. A singular honor came in 2020-21 and 2022 when she was named one of the Hoosier Women Artists, in which her work was selected to be exhibited during those dates in the Indiana State House with the Lieutenant Governor and the Indiana State Treasurer.
In 2015, Ramseier took a new direction with her art. She opened a studio she named “The Art Giraffe.” In this environment, she is able to teach weekly classes in watercolor, has an art safari for artists, and also provides monthly Saturday classes. The first weekend in November is her yearly open house, where the studio is transformed into a gallery for the sale and show of her art. You can find more information about this excellent artist on the Internet at theartgiraffe.com or Facebook at “The Art Giraffe.”
During the next three months, we will be hosting this inspirational artist’s work at the Warsaw City Hall Art Gallery, 102 S. Buffalo St., which is across from the county courthouse. The gallery is open from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., except for holidays. There is never a charge to visit these exhibits and the public is welcome. If you are a teacher and would like Ramseier to talk to your students, arrangements can be made. Please contact Darla McCammon at [email protected].