Franklin senior Katie Kinder took her first limo ride when she was in elementary school.

“When I was in the first grade, I drew myself in a limo with my hair flowing out of the window,” said Katie, now 21.

That drawing won the art contest at Franklin Elementary, and Katie’s prize was a limo ride around her hometown.

Her mother, Patty Kinder, said the family has always kept art material around the house, so her daughter was exposed to art at a very young age.

Katie explained that her mother was an art teacher, and her father went to school for graphic design but is now a color analyst at Quad/Graphics in Franklin.

“I’ve stuck with art because I’ve had so many good influences around me,” she said.

Katie lists her eighth grade teacher, Angie Yarano, and her sister, Kari Kinder, 18, among her biggest influences.

“Katie is really self-motivated and good,” Kari said. “She projects herself in what she does without getting overwhelmed, and her personality resonates in her work.”

Yarano transferred to Franklin-Simpson High School at the same time Kinder started her freshman year of high school.

But she had noticed Katie’s talent as early as sixth grade.

“Her work is intriguing because it’s complicated and pulls you in,” Yarano said.

Katie is currently a graphic design major with a minor in painting.

While she plans to make a living from graphic design, painting is more personal to her.

Last semester she hit a rough patch in her personal life and painting, which she likened to a “writer’s block.”

“The past year was really tough on me,” she said. “I moved a few times, I was sick a few times, my cat died, and my relationship ended, but art helped me through it.”

She said that facing all those obstacles just reinforced how much she appreciates painting.

“If I stop creating, I stop being myself,” Katie said.

She said she’s inspired by anything and everything in her surroundings, and picking her favorite painting is like picking favorites between children.

But some of her favorite work includes landscape and bird pieces from last fall.

“I’m attached to them, but I find flaws in them because I’m me,” she said.

Katie plans to pursue advertising and business in graduate school after she finishes her undergrad at WKU in fall 2011.

She also hopes to open up an art shop with her sister in the future. She wants a multipurpose setting for musicians, artists and anyone else who wants to visit.

“I want to attract all different kinds of people because that’s what art is – reaching out to people in some way,” she said.