THE VISION OF CARA HARJES ART
As a passionate artist, teacher, and coach, I boldly curate safe, inspiring, cozy connections and experiences through making and sharing original artwork, leading workshops and retreats, and engaging in empowering and healing one-one-one conversations with my clients.
Imagine walking into a creative space designed to dazzle your senses. You immediately feel cozy and safe; you let your guard down and you exhale, like really exhale. Maybe for the first time in days. You take off all of the heavy cloaks you wear during any given day. You’re stripped down, but you’re not naked - you are adorned in your passion, truth, and pure brilliance! You’re free. Free to question. To wonder. To be curious. You’re supported. Protected. Invited.
You’re free - free to be amazed and to be amazing!
meet Cara
After years of floating through life as a deeply creative being with a rich inner life, but without an expressive outlet, Cara’s late husband Herb asked her to make a painting for him the Christmas of 2009. Without much of an art background, she bought a canvas and went for it. From there, Cara was propelled into a world of color, texture, and deep feelings that she could have only dreamt existed when she was a little girl in the back of her mom’s wood-paneled minivan. And that very first painting? Well, it still hangs in her kitchen.
Once she discovered she was an artist and slipped into her authentic self, the next steps became clear to Cara: empower other women to discover and rediscover their creative parts (we all have them!) and to embrace and express their truest selves! Intuitive painting became the unexpected (but now beloved) portal through which Cara teaches women to embrace every last beautiful, messy part of themselves and their one wild and precious life.
LIFE EXPERIENCE: EXPERIENCING LIFE
Perhaps Cara is qualified to teach intuitive painting because she has been an avid student and self-taught intuitive painter since 2010.
Or maybe it's the ten years prior to that during the early 2000s in which she spent working as a psychotherapist with a Master’s Degree in Counseling that gives her a platform for empowering, supporting, and nurturing women while challenging them to be the truest versions of themselves. It could even be the years of picking the perfect playlist, arranging on-point charcuterie boards, and hosting kickass parties with her late husband, Herb, where people let their hair down, which ultimately led Cara to create Cara Harjes Art. No matter her background or inspiration, Cara's art and and all of her course offerings are her ultimate gift to the world.
It is her gift to you.
working through it
Several years after that first painting was completed and signed, Cara’s beloved husband, parenting partner, and partner in crime died from cancer. Out of breath (how does one ever breathe again after that???) and with two tiny girl humans in tow, she had some decisions to make. At the top of the list was “What in the world now?”
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It has been messy and painful and sometimes downright ugly, but ultimately Cara answered the question: “I want to keep living. Not just sustain a heartbeat in a body. I want to live. I want to unharness my desires, unleash my gifts, and deep dive into the truest depths of myself. I want to splash color all around me!”
Cara believes that life is beautiful. And she knows that it is messy, confusing, and sometimes undeniably cruel. There is no denying or sugar coating that. She believes both. One doesn’t cancel out the other. They exist. Together. At the same time.
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She is all about embracing the beauty and the mess. The light and the dark. The challenges and the triumph.
And there’s not much more she would like than to bring you along with her for the wild, bumpy, glorious ride! Well, except maybe chicken and waffles. She loves chicken and waffles. No matter, we can grab those along the way. Let’s GO!
