Kara Maria is a visual artist working in painting, drawing, printmaking and public art. Her recent work addresses the urgent issues of climate change, biodiversity loss, and their significant impact on humanity.

She meticulously paints miniature portraits of threatened, endangered, and extinct animals amid fields of flying shapes, twisting lines, and swirling colors. These small creatures serve as still points in the surrounding chaos. They inhabit larger, distinctly unnatural, cartoonish environments influenced by comic book graphics, music theory, and the realm of contemporary painting. These works celebrate the joy and exuberance of life to emphasize the incredible variety of existence on our planet—the only one confirmed to harbor life.

Maria received her BA and MFA from the University of California, Berkeley. She has exhibited her work in solo and group shows throughout the United States at venues including the de Saisset Museum at Santa Clara University, CA; the Sonoma Valley Museum of Art, Sonoma, CA; the Nevada Museum of Art, Reno, NV; the Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston, TX; and the Katonah Museum of Art in New York.

Her work is included in the permanent collections of the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive; the Crocker Art Museum in Sacramento; the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco; the San Jose Museum of Art; and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, among others.

A native of Binghamton, New York, Kara Maria now lives and works in San Francisco, California.