Caryn Kepford received her BFA in Painting and Art History from the Philadelphia College of Art (now the University of the Arts) in 1982 where she graduated with honors. She received her MFA in Figurative Painting in 2014 at the Academy of Art University in San Francisco, California.   Having had the privilege of extended travel throughout Europe and Egypt, Caryn has gained an understanding of the art of the western world, knowledge which informs her studio and teaching practices.  Caryn lived in Maine most of her adult life and was inspired by its beauty and benefited from the legacy of many great landscape painters.  In 2015, Caryn relocated to the beautiful, rolling prairie of central Iowa.  She is a passionate art educator and developed a unique studio/art history curriculum for the Maine Classical School in Freeport, Maine.  She continues to teach students of all ages through classical methodology and is currently on the faculty of the Des Moines Art Center.  “Etudes of Harpswell”  (August 2014) was her MFA Thesis exhibition and her first solo show.