Cynthia Kukla, a Chicago native, received her BFA in Painting from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, under Ray Yoshida, and MFA in Painting from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

She exhibits paintings, watercolors, drawings and sculptures in curated museum exhibits since graduate school on four continents, in over fifty solo shows and nearly three-hundred curated or group exhibitions. Her first tenured position was at Northern Kentucky University, first sabbatical as a visiting artist in Geneva, Switzerland. “Objects without Prejudice’ Series was created there followed by the ‘Great Queen’ Series including 18 foot triptychs and bronze sculptures made at the University of Cincinnati for ‘Thrones for a Great Queen.’ At Illinois State University, her first sabbatical was at Miami University, Ohio. At her Cincinnati sabbatical studio, she completed 230 paintings and 13 sketchbooks leading to numerous exhibitions. In 2004, she was a keynote speaker for the symposium for the exhibition “Coming of Age in Ancient Greece,” at the Cincinnati Art Museum.

A Greek odyssey followed: a visiting professorship for her 2006-07 sabbatical at Aristotle Thessaloniki University, Greece, one of the largest universities in Europe. Two months in Greece, she completed over 110 watercolors at solo weeklong trips to sites and museums at Delphi, Dion, Athens, Crete and Istanbul. She returned to Greece in 2014 and 2015 for more extensive painting trips and visiting professorships, painting at archeological sites throughout Greece and Crete including Phillippi and Aristotle’s birthplace, Stagira. This work was featured in solo exhibits in 2016, 2017 and 2021.

In 2006, she was inducted into the Watercolor Honor Society. International exhibits include Japan in 2010, and Viet Nam in 2011. She made a special painting of the Thai Emerald Buddha for Viet Nam. In 2012, she was one of four artists invited for the yearlong “No Greater Gods” exhibition at the University of Virginia. In 2015, she was invited to “Silk Roads Festival Exhibition at the Shaanxi Provincial Museum, China. Her sculptural tableaux Aras Paxis (Altar of Peace) was on view at “S.O.S. Art 2020” in Cincinnati.

Cynthia spoke at numerous international conferences: the Enlightenment aesthetic panel at “Impact~ Kontakt” in Berlin, Germany and Poznan, Poland, 2005. While in Berlin, she had special permission for two days drawing the iconic Queen Nefertiti sculpture at the Altes Museum. She spoke at Impact in 2007 in Tallinn, Estonia on Enlightenment aesthetics:  Classical Practices:  Are Artists Still Embracing Them?

In 2009, she was invited to exhibit in the acclaimed Tallinn Drawing Triennial, Mana Propria, and teach a Master Class at the Triennial’s Drawing Marathon at the Art Academy in Tallinn. In 2010, she was invited to teach a faculty workshop at Srinakharinwirot University, Bangkok, Thailand, again in 2011, along with teaching Western painting and watercolors, painting at ancient sites on weekends at Panomrung, Chiang Mai, Ayutthaya and Wat Arun and in temples in Bangkok during her two-month invitation.

Art residencies supported by grants include:  Balatonfured, Hungary, Vermont Studio Center, Virginia Center at Sweetbriar, Millay Colony, New York, and Studios Midwest, Illinois and in 2022 a writers residency in Wisconsin. Other research grants took her to Poland, Great Britain, Ireland, Germany, Switzerland and Taiwan. Her commissions include the Spurlock Museum of World Culture, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.  She was invited to create five paintings to represent each of five major cultural galleries for the museum inauguration.

In 2024, her work was featured at the ArtExpo NYC and in a four-person show at the Edward A. Dixon Gallery in Dayton, OH.