By Ronald Ahrens

Our classmate and friend, Kim Cooper, sent a couple of photos from Greenwood, Neb., saying he “took a drive this evening checking out some subject matter. Great light in late afternoon.”

Kim is an artist and the proprietor of Cooper Studio & Gallery, located at 1526 Silver St. in Ashland, Neb. The studio and gallery opened in 2001. He likes to work in the plein air style, which often finds him painting outdoors and trying to capture the subtleties of light and shadow.

Besides the oil paintings, Cooper Studio & Gallery also offers watercolors, pottery, jewelry, and hand-crafted wooden vessels.

Starting in 1969, Kim and I were classmates at Morton Junior High School and then during a sophomore year at Burke High School in Omaha before a realignment swept him away to the brand-new Northwest High.

Besides our friendship, he knows Kristen Cart “fairly well” and her father, Jerry Osborn, who lives in Ashland.

“I met her father before I knew he was her dad,” he says.

We have featured Kim’s work in the past and are always happy to see more. To find those previous posts, enter his name in the search window to the right of this window.