FRANKFORT, Ky. (LEX 18) \u2014 A Franklin County Schools fine arts teacher has achieved a remarkable milestone by becoming the first educator from Western Hills High School to have her artwork displayed in the world-famous Louvre museum in Paris, France.<\/p>\n
Jan Kirstein’s mixed media collages are now on display at the renowned museum, marking a significant achievement for both the teacher and her school district.<\/p>\n
“I thought I was hallucinating,” Kirstein said about learning of her acceptance into the Louvre. “I couldn’t believe it.”<\/p>\n
Despite her artwork now hanging in one of the world’s most prestigious museums, Kirstein has yet to visit the Louvre in person.<\/p>\n
“I’ve seen lots of pictures,” Kirstein said.<\/p>\n
Her artwork consists of mixed media collages that combine photography with painting in a unique digital process.<\/p>\n
“They’re mixed media collages,” Kirstein said. “I take parts of my paintings and I put them all together digitally and print ’em and paint over the top of them again.”<\/p>\n
For Kirstein, the creative process serves as both passion and therapy. She describes her art as something that sustains her through difficult times.<\/p>\n
“It keeps going even though there’s often times I feel like there’s no reason to keep going,” Kirstein said. “No matter how bad I feel when I go in and I start painting in my studio I come out feeling better.”<\/p>\n
The artistic process is deeply personal for Kirstein.<\/p>\n
“You look into your soul and it comes out,” Kirstein said.<\/p>\n
Word of her achievement has spread throughout Western Hills High School, where her students have been celebrating the news.<\/p>\n
“They’ve been congratulating me,” Kirstein said. “Some of them don’t know what the Louvre is so they kinda have to figure that out.”<\/p>\n
When asked about her future plans following this achievement, Kirstein remains open to possibilities.<\/p>\n
“We’ll see where it takes me,” Kirstein said.<\/p>\n
Kirstein’s next exhibition will be closer to home. Her artwork will be featured at the Pyro Gallery in Louisville on June 7.<\/p>\n
An artist cooperative, PYRO Gallery at 1006 East Washington Street in Louisville Kentucky, is composed of 20 Artists with various areas of artistic expertise.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FRANKFORT, Ky. (LEX 18) \u2014 A Franklin County Schools fine arts teacher has achieved a remarkable milestone by…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":251030,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[56],"tags":[228,226,227,229,88],"class_list":{"0":"post-251029","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-arts-and-design","8":"tag-arts","9":"tag-arts-and-design","10":"tag-artsanddesign","11":"tag-design","12":"tag-entertainment"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/251029","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=251029"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/251029\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/251030"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=251029"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=251029"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=251029"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}