Akiane Kramarik: The prodigy who was told to paint by God
In 2003, the art world was struck by Prince of Peace, a large, oil on canvas piece depicting a portrait of Jesus Christ head-on and staring straight into the eyes of the viewer. While unremarkable conceptually, its technique and evident painting mastery were notable for the age of its creator, Akiane Kramarik, who committed 40 hours to her celebrated piece at only eight years old. When probed as to the inspiration behind her work, she claimed to have been experiencing visions four years earlier featuring Jesus’ encouragement of her creative endeavours.
Quite where this divine, artisan gift came from was a mystery to her parents. Born in 1994 in Illinois’ Mount Morris village, her Lithuanian mother, Forelli and Chicagoan father, Mark, were both atheists who spent little time discussing Christianity or attending Church.
Yet Kramarik’s childhood was one outside the mainstream, attending a parochial school before being home taught, and exposed to scant popular culture in her rural upbringing with minimal television or radio in the house.
“Religious art of sculptures, reliefs and paintings in one of the parochial schools I attended greatly influenced my later attraction to legendary figures,” Kramarik states on her official website. “For the first time I got to encounter the world’s view of what divinity was supposed to be, but deep down I felt that I perceived everything in a much broader and deeper sense. It appeared to me as if most people were completely ignorant of other realities, or that the realities they perceived were seen only from a very narrow angle”.
It’s lofty stuff for a child. Nonetheless, the supposed angelic guidance to translate “colourful dreams and visions about heaven, Jesus, and God’s amazing love” to canvas triggered the six-year-old Kramarik to begin painting large-scale pieces centred on her love of animals, family, fantastical landscapes, and her relationship with the Lord. Her first self-portrait sold for $10,000, and by 12 years old, she’d completed 60 works with one hanging in the US Embassy in Singapore.
The skill at such a young age is undeniably phenomenal. When most kids are still fingerpainting, Kramarik was already capable of capturing subjects with a solid grasp of proportion, perspective depth, and impeccable lighting, often painting a single light source to bathe her subject obscured in dramatic shadows. She’s also forged a second career for herself as a poet, publishing a second book of collected poems at just 11.
Is Kramarik’s work any good? If removing yourself from the astonishing talent way beyond her years, Kramarik’s litany of cosmic universes and pious carpenters looking heavenward borders on kitsch, all wrapped in a gaudy presentation that never penetrates anywhere particularly stirring or evocative. For such celestial forces supposedly behind her work, Kramarik’s holy galumph feels shorn of all awe, wonder, and spiritual energy that her thrift store pieces point towards.
Kramarik’s story is an incredible one, however, a curious examination of untapped creativity and how deep, personal inspiration can be gleaned from unexpected environments and at any stage in our lives.
