About Me
KayLove was born in the West Bronx in 1975 to two native Puerto Rican parents. She developed her passion for painting through her mother, who guided Karen through her elementary school years, with no formal training herself. A child of the 80's , she was inspired by the museums that the trains provided, the roof tops murals, tags and colors that brightened up a once dirty and destroyed Bronx. Karen carried with her a notebook trying to draw what she saw. Soon the beats and streets of the Bronx gave birth to KayLove.
She attended the famed High School of Art & Design in 1989 where the echos of graffiti pioneers and alumni like Lady Pink, Mare, Doze and others vibrated strongly within her. She developed her love for letters while hitting blackbooks and tagging locally. In 1993 she graduated and went on to attend Adelphi University and then later Lehman College of the Performing Arts where she majored in painting and secondary education. During this time she was the only female graffiti artist featured in the PBS show In The Mix alongside her graffiti peers speaking about her love for the form. In 1995 she was featured in Cope2 graffiti documentary Kings Destroy.
KayLove studied mural painting under famed New York artist, Manny Vega Jr. Under Vega she became his teacher’s assistant at the Legacy High School. She also worked for the Guggenheim Museum’s Learn through Arts program where she taught mural design in a number of public schools in El Barrio. With her knowledge and love for graffiti and mural, KayLove became a NY Cares mural artist where she would paint in schools across Queens, Manhattan and the Bronx.
Throughout her career she has exhibited at Stony Brook University, Camaradas, Wallworks, Poe Park Visitor Center Gallery, Bronx Art Space, and BX Arts Factory group shows and has her work published in Arcano Italian graffiti magazine. KayLove is a resident artist for Windows of Hip Hop, a non profit, Bronx based economic development project promoting the educational, communal, and historical perspective of Hip Hop. Our ultimate goal is to create a state of the art, fully interactive, educational institution dedicated to Hip Hop in the Bronx and screen printer. She currently spends her time creating graphic designs, drawing, painting, and volunteering with various grass roots groups, teaching Art/mural workshops and beautifying the Bronx one mural at a time.