Artistically Speaking | karenconger.net

About (artisticallyspeaking)

Karen Conger, Artist - Painting Memories

What's art got to do with Karen I. Conger PhD, Qualitative Research Consultant and Analyst?

Everything! I have always integrated my interests as an artist into my academic professional and personal life. We all know the energy and feelings that creativity gives to our day!

Art education: My formal and informal art background includes certified illustration, plus numerous onsite and ongoing online workshops and academies in the USA and UK presented by the best artists available! I enjoy a mix of online and on-site to get the best of both.

My main style is realism and my subject(s) of choice are endangered wildlife and domestic pets and animals painted in traditional media (soft pastel, ink, colored pencil) or as digital art paintings.

2025! I have recently focused on creating a unique digital art design. In the examples below, I used my own photographs and created a single painting merging the photos with my digital painting skills and capturing my best memories of that place and time. There is a story behind every painting.

icedog Copyright © 2025 KarenConger.net All Rights Reserved

This sweet family dog loved the winter cold and didn't want to come inside so look closely and you will see I created him as an 'ice dog' painting standing beside 'himself' in a photo with the red leash.

The winter landscape was cropped from a royalty free image I found online.

I used two photographs for the dog; the ice dog was my digital painting from one of the photographs.

Personality always matters - for all living things! And this captured the best of Roake that we all remember.

Three of my personal photographs were merged and I added extra mist and fog, major highlights and lowlights on our horses, and cropping as needed to get another unique scene that provides my best memories of our space and horses.

Five personal photographs were used to create this mountain scene with our three Tennessee Walking horses. The result is much prettier than the reference photos I started using. I painted a lot of highlights, lowlights, and blended as needed to create the new landscape. It is the image in my mind when I think about our time there!

Again, personality is the key. One of our Tennessee Walking horse loved to eat and in this picture, I gave her some grass! The other two Walkers shared alpha and beta personalities as required to protect the herd. No corrals, no fences. Just mountains in the distance and the beautiful fog covering the valley. And our alpha/beta pair ever watchful. Ever beautiful!

The painting in this art focused on highlights and extra details after merging the photos and blending as needed to provide the best surfaces.

My digital painting of 'boy' and 'dog' combined with my reference photo of 'man', 'boy' and 'dog' on the trail. The painting is intentionally out of scale to emphasize it. (Stars on photo faces were inserted for public display only.)

The dog in the foreground is my digital painting. The background is a combination of two cropped and merged photographs. The dog in the background was cropped from one of my photographs. The park photo is cropped from a royalty-free online site photograph.

Wildlife and Animal Portfolio - Traditional (soft pastel, ink, colored pencil) and Digital Pen

These are complete paintings working with traditional or digital media. The paintings above incorporate the photo(s) with the painting(s). The paintings below are pure 100% paintings using a reference photo or (multiple reference photos) as a guide! They take a lot more time, of course!

Focusing on endangered wildlife, pets, and anything equine!

"Snow Leopard - Silent Guardian"

Soft Pastel

Przewalski horse painting - karenconger.net

"Przewalski's Horse - Faces the Storm"

Soft Pastel

"Okapi - Velvet Ghost of the Forest"

Digital Pen

karenconger.net (CA mountain lion painting)

CA Mtn Lion 'Night Vigil'

Digital Pen

karenconger.net (Giraffa Camelopardalis painting)

"Giraffa Camelopardalis - Tallest of All"

Digital Pen

karenconger.net (African Elephant painting)

"African Elephant - Morning Call.jpg"

Colored Pencil

karenconger.net (Grevy's zebra painting)

"Grevy's Zebra Mother and Foal.jpg"

Digital Pen

"Cheetah Cubs - Your Cheetah Eyes

Digital Pen

karenconger.net (Black Jaguar Mother & Cub painting)

karenconger.net (African lion cub painting)

karenconger.net (Amur Sibertian tiger painting)

"Amur (Siberian) Tiger - Territorial (I'm watching you)"

Digital Pen

karenconger.net [Bobcat (lynx) painting]

"Insight - Black Jaguar Mother and Cub"

Digital Pen

"African Lion Cub - Born with Spots"

Soft Pastel

"Bobcat In The Mist"

Digital Pen

"Amur Leopard - Elusive Power"

Digital Pen

karenconger.net (Spaniel retriever mini mix painting pet dog)

"Copper on Guard"

Colored Pencil

Working from a variety of great and not so great reference photos helps me refine the subject's character. Contact me to see if we can get something created from your best memories! Focusing on animals - wildlife, equine, and pets - and working with you to combine and paint your best memories!

All images and Content -