From California, to Canada, back to California to marry her very best friend, and now in Sisters! Jennifer Hartwig is “scratching out” a living in the best place on earth! Scratching?

Yes! Jennifer is a intensely gifted artist who expresses the joy in her life through scratchboard art. “It builds my spirit as I work from the nothingness of black. The work comes alive with each dot and scratch I place on the board.” And there are thousands of scratches in each work.

A scratchboard is a drawing board coated with a fine layer of white clay, then top-coated with permanent black ink. Using a sharp, scribing tool (like an Exacto knife or a wire brush) Jennifer creates pictures. Each image is made up of thousands of marks on the surface of the board, producing a white mark that represents a light in the design.

Jennifer takes her work one step beyond by adding layer upon layer of colored ink, in a dry-brush technique, then re-scratching that surface. She mixes the cyan, magenta, yellow and black inks to arrive at custom color blends. Each of her custom scratch art images requires at least a hundred hours’ work. When she is satisfied with the final image, she coats the surface, resulting in a work of art that is beautiful in its own right. Custom framing finalizes the piece.

Her work has won awards at the Sisters Library Community Show (People’s Choice – twice!) and at the Episcopal Church Country Fair (Best of Show – Mixed Media). She has a website and a Facebook page .

Jennifer often takes a theme and explores it deeply. She recently completed “A Confluence of Eagles” (seven images). After a display in the Sisters Library, they flew into Sisters Gallery, where they are proudly perched.

She also creates custom scratch portraits of your best pet friend – dog, cat, bird, even a pet pig! Jennifer will consult with you to create a memorable portrait that will be cherished forever. Be sure to check out her scratch portrait of Sisters Gallery's own "shop dog," Logan. "Why, it looks just like him!" people exclaim.