"Deborah Kennedy’s art and writing combines compelling themes and intriguing images and invites contemplation, dialogue and action."
Deborah Kennedy is an author and artist whose work has been presented in the United States and Europe. Her recent book, Nature Speaks: Art and Poetry for the Earth (2016, White Cloud Press), combines illustrations and poetry focusing on the ecological themes of our time. Nature Speaks won numerous awards including the 2017 Eric Hoffer Poetry and Silver Nautilus Poetry book awards. Kennedy has also received awards from the Bay Area Poets Coalition for her work. Her writing has appeared or is forthcoming in First Literary Review-East, All Creation and Canary. Her art exhibitions include numerous solo and group shows featuring objects and conceptually-based installations focusing on ecological and social themes. She is noted for creating four large-scale installations on the Berlin Wall six months before it was torn down. This work was an inspiration to thousands who witnessed art in the service of social change and has been featured in books and newspapers in Germany and the United States. Her work has been widely reviewed and she has received numerous grants and awards from Art Councils and museums in California. Kennedy lives in San Jose, CA where she teaches college classes and poetry workshops. She presents poetry readings with multimedia slide lectures on her work at bookstores, schools, and to poetry, ecology and spiritual groups. She often hikes in an urban riparian corridor where she spots osprey, hawks and herons. In the evening she watches for moon bows, earthshine and other modern miracles.