From Pueblo, Colorado, Kim Mackey sought a quiet environment in his birthplace after spending time in Denver where he studied illustration at the Colorado Institute of Art.

He had a career as a commercial artist including being a police-sketch artist, but in 1985, turned full time to his fine art painting because his gallery sales were able to support him financially.

He paints a variety of subjects from still life to figures, but prefers paintings with cowboys and horses and landscape--Colorado ranch life, which reflects his family heritage of a long line of cattle ranchers. He paints primarily in his studio, working from photographs, but also does some painting on location.

Source:
Southwest Art, March 2001, by Rose Glaser.

Kim Mackey grew up in Pueblo, Colorado. He attended public schools and, through his interest and ability in art, won a scholarship to attend the Colorado Institute of Art in Denver. Following art school, Mackey worked for several years as an illustrator, completing assignments for such clients as True West magazine, Western Horseman and Capitol Records.

Special studies at Colorado State University qualified him as one of only a few certified police artists in the state, but recognition from his peers and collectors led him away from commercial work and illustration into full time fine-art painting.

Mackey also coaches students; he is a popular teacher, conducting workshops and classes throughout the region. He has been a faculty instructor at the Art Students League of Denver, and has taught at the Colorado Institute of Art.

His credentials list numerous awards, including the prestigious Winsor Newton Award from the Oil Painters of America. He has exhibited at the Salmagundi Club in New York, the Oil Painters of America in Chicago, Illinois and San Antonio, Texas, the Colorado Governor's Invitational Show in Loveland, Colorado, and the Coors Western Art Show in Denver, Colorado.

His paintings hang in collections, including that of the singer/songwriter Neil Diamond. Mackey's work is also included in the King Collection at the Sangre de Cristo Fine Art Center in Pueblo, Colorado.

Mackey is a signature member of the Oil Painters of America, and has been featured in Art Revue magazine, The Artist's Magazine, Southwest Art magazine, and Western Horseman magazine, as well as Cowboys and Indians magazine. The Denver Post has called him "a master of [his] genre," and Southwest Art has acknowledged him as a traditional cowboy artist in the finest sense of the word.

Source:
Information from the artist, 2003