Katie Hammersmith, a sophomore at Marysville High School, is pictured working on a charcoal portrait of Assistant Wrestling Coach Rae McDonald. Working on hyperrealistic, large-scale pieces allows Katie to show admiration for her subjects and connect with them in a way otherwise impossible. “I always think it’s funny, like, I know exactly what your nose looks like,” Katie joked.
(Photo submitted)
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“Emotional Tug-of-War,” a gouache painting created by Katie Hammersmith in Mrs. Kelly Friend’s class, was selected for exhibition in the Rhoades State Office Tower as part of the Governor’s Youth Art Exhibition. Katie said she hopes viewers relate to the painting and can connect with the emotions she portrays.
(Photo submitted)
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For Katie Hammersmith, it’s almost as though art is in her blood.
When the Marysville High School sophomore would create drawings as a child, her grandfather would sit her down for hours-long sessions to break down her techniques and share suggestions as to how she could improve.
He was eager to offer insight from his college studies of design and his career creating logos for companies, which Katie said could quickly lead to two hours of “dissecting” her amateur art.
“When you think about the things that are passed down, it has gone through generations,” said Katie’s mom, Kelly Hammersmith, who remembers participating in similar sessions when she was younger.
“I love the bond that they share.”
When Katie’s work was selected for the Governor’s Youth Art Exhibition, she said she walked into her grandfather’s home to see an image of her piece displayed on his TV screen and him holding a remote, ready to zoom in on areas for them to discuss.
Their relationship has evolved, she said, from one in which he was like an art teacher giving a lesson to now sharing feedback and learning from one another.
“As I’ve gotten older, it’s felt more like a partnership,” Katie said.
Time spent nurturing her love for art and her talent is already paying off after, for the second straight year, her artwork was selected to be displayed in the Governor’s Youth Art Exhibition.
This year, her gouache painting titled “Emotional Tug-of-War” is one of 326 pieces – selected from nearly 3,000 submissions – to hang in the Rhodes State Office Tower in Columbus.
While Katie’s passion for art has spanned her entire life, her journey to statewide recognition started in sixth grade when she discovered hyperrealism.
She began drawing photo-like images with graphite pencils before colored pencil became her “main medium.”
At first, she drew things she enjoyed and looked for photos that would give her a challenge, whether that was tackling a different texture or detail.
“Every time I did a drawing, I tried to work on something else,” Katie said, adding that she can see the “progression” when she flips through her old, colored pencil-filled sketchbook.
As she began to experiment with watercolors and paint in eighth grade, Katie said she also began exploring how to incorporate more creativity into her pieces.
She said she started to ask herself, “What is the purpose of what I’m putting down?”
Katie credited her art teachers, Mrs. Shelly Hasser, for teaching her how objects and space work on paper and how to think outside the box, and Mrs. Kelly Friend, for helping her discover new mediums and learn how to put herself on the page.
It was Mrs. Friend who first introduced her to the medium that garnered her first statewide-recognition: chalk.
Katie said they were working on a graphite still life for a class assignment and Mrs. Friend told her that she knew she was proficient with pencil drawings.
Instead, why didn’t she give something else a shot?
Ironically enough, the first time she picked up chalk, the piece was selected by the Governor for exhibition and later purchased by the Ohio Department of Education, where it is now displayed in their offices.
Katie said it can be difficult to come up with a good answer when people ask how she creates her pieces because the process is almost “mindless” to her at this point.
She said she often battles anxious feelings and feels millions of thoughts running through her mind, but creating art allows her to quiet everything else.
“When I do art, my brain is focused on one thing,” Katie said.
As a person who is “very organized” and “loves being tidy,” it makes sense that hyperrealism – a style that requires intense attention to the smallest details – appeals to her.
Katie said she has always approached situations by breaking things down. Through art, she enjoys the challenge of seeing exactly “how small I can go.”
When she creates portraits, she said she sees tiny sections rather than the entire person.
“Skin is just triangles and circles,” Katie said.
Although it can seem taxing to narrow in on such small details, Katie said her knack for doing so and the process of creating art is “a gift from God” that is filled with joy.
She typically paints or draws with her headphones in, sometimes playing folksy music by Noah Kahan, other times blasting her current favorite rap songs or even playing the soundtrack from the musical “Hamilton.”
Regardless of the genre, she said she often finds herself “belting out” the music while she’s putting pencil to paper.
“You can see that I’m having fun while I do it,” she said.
Art is not just one portion of Katie’s life but something that permeates everything she does.
The MHS student is also on the girls’ wrestling team, a thrower on the track and field team and is technically on the cross country team, although she jokes that it isn’t her strongest sport.
She is also very involved with American Heritage Girls, a faith-based organization similar to Girl Scouts.
“Art has helped me be a better wrestler. Wrestling has helped me be a better artist,” Katie said.
Learning to see things from a different perspective as an artist helps her to reassess situations when on the wrestling mat.
Bonding with other students in art class and sharing techniques has shown her the give-and-take that she brings to her friendships in AHG.
Staring at an art piece “for 10 hours” has taught her that some circumstances will eventually need a fresh set of eyes.
“My approach to art is very similar to my approach in life,” she said.
Most importantly, art has formed the basis of relationships in a way that almost nothing else could.
Whether with her grandparents, Bill Howard and Beth Sussman, or the subject of her portraits, like her assistant wrestling coach Rae McDonald, Katie said art lets her “show love in a way some people don’t realize it can be shown.”
“You can put words into art without actually putting words on the art,” she said.
Katie said she is hopeful that she will be able to continue doing just that throughout her future.
Soon, she will begin working on a portfolio that will consist of series of pieces with coherent themes, rather than standalone works.
Her goal is to earn a scholarship to study art in college and, eventually, make a career in the field, whether that is pursuing childhood dreams of being a children’s book illustrator or selling the pieces she creates.
Regardless of exactly what profession her art leads to, she can’t see a time when it would actually feel like work.
“If I can get a job in art, I would love that,” Katie said. “But I hope art never becomes a job for me.”