Born in Kansas City in 1969, Boydston grew up in a typical suburban middle-class neighborhood. Her interest in art at an early age made it a natural choice for a career. However, her working-class parents urged her to find a more “traditional and secure” way to make a living. With scholarship money helping pay the way, she began her education in Springfield, Missouri at Southwest MO State University, earning a B.S.ED. in Art Education. Boydston worked as an elementary art teacher for six years in Kansas City then decided to stay at home to raise her family and focus on her own art. She began the Master of Arts studio art program at UMKC in 2002, rising to the challenge of balancing her time between, coursework, painting, and family life. Seeing her children growing fast, Boydston reached for her camera and found herself not only capturing her children’s play and activities but also the immediate surrounding in which she lived. It is from these frozen moments in time that inspired Boydston to use her own daily suburban life in her art. Boydston explores the dichotomy of suburban life as it relates to our personal ideas of internal and external, private and public. She incorporates a practical search for spirituality with many of the images she portrays often using water as a metaphor for renewal, rebirth and cleansing. The innocence of children in honest play provides an atmosphere of living in the moment and positive redemption from an otherwise monotonous space and stressful daily routine.
Born 1969 Kansas City, MO
1987 SMSU Art Department Scholarship Award-Full Tuition
1989 Edgar A. Albin Art Scholarship Award
1991 BSED Art Education K-12, Cum Laude Southwest Missouri State University (Currently MSU) Springfield, MO
1994-2000 Elementary Art Teacher K-5 USD 500 KCKS
1996-2000 USD500 Annual Art Staff Exhibits KCKS Public Libraries
2004 April-Student Juried Exhibition Fine Arts Gallery UMKC
2005 February -Winter Invitational Graduate Exhibition, Fine Arts Gallery-UMKC
2005 April -Something to Digest, Juried Student Exhibition, Fine Arts Gallery -UMKC (Juror: Elizabeth Dunbar, Kemper Gallery of Contemporary Art KCMO)
2006 February- Kansas City Artists Coalition Anual Auction Exhibition Mallin/Charno Galleries, Kansas City, MO
2006 February to March- Playing With the Grid M.A. Solo Thesis exhibition Fine Arts Gallery UMKC
2006 May- Juried Student Exhibition (Graduate Best of Show) , Fine Arts Gallery UMKC, (Juror: Emily Eddins, Dolphin Gallery, Kansas City, MO)
2006 May- M.A. Studio Art, UMKC
2006 September 8-October 7, Twentieth Anniversary Alumni Invitational Exhibit, Missouri State University Exhibition Center, Springfield, MO.
2007 January- TMC Healing Arts Gallery Invitational Exhibition, Truman Medical Center, Kansas City, MO (Curator: Elizabeth Lurey)
2007 February- Kansas City Artist Coalition Annual Auction Exhibit, Mallin/Charno Galleries, Kansas City, MO
2007 August- Suburban Redemption-Solo Exhibition, Unity Temple Gallery, Kansas City, MO
2008 February- Kansas City Artist Coalition Annual Auction Exhibit, Mallin/Charno Galleries, Kansas City, MO