Kelly Sullivan (painter)
American painter (born 1964)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Kelly Sullivan (born April 30, 1964) is an American painter known for her collaborative paintings called "Finger Smears."[1][2] Sullivan combines Finger Smears with the signatures of hundreds of people on one canvas to commemorate events.[3]
Sullivan was born in New Brunswick, New Jersey. Her maternal grandmother, Alice Foster, taught her to paint at an early age. Her studio was formerly in Driggs, Idaho,[3][4] but is currently in Lambertville, NJ.[5]
Sullivan claims that her collaborative painting projects have involved thousands of participants, including well-known musicians.[1][2] Sullivan's work with FingerSmears has reportedly raised over $150,000 for charities.[4] Her FingerSmear entitled "The Hands for Hope" was auctioned off to benefit the September 11th Fund.[6]
Sullivan has developed two spin-off projects from her FingerSmears: Mighty Fingers Facing Change (MFFC) and Paint.Team.[7][8] MFFC is a two-part art project designed to engage and inspire girls through a guided self-portrait. This portrait expresses their individual goals and the changes they would like to see in the world, as well as allowing them to participate in a collaborative FingerSmear called "Abundance."[7] Sullivan has taken MFFC to Guatemala, Uganda, Haiti, India, China, and the US.[7] Paint.Team was launched as a web-based tool, a "digital FingerSmear" app, that allows thousands to participate in one piece of art from anywhere in the world using their computers or smartphones. Sullivan enlisted a team of software and web developers to make this app available.[8]
