LinksKuhns wanted the mood and color scheme of springtime to reflect the timing of the event, which occurs Friday and Saturday.
"I was thinking about it being the time to pick fresh herbs and things," she said. "I felt it really came together well."
The mosaic artist creates pieces using glass, tile and other materials.
"I'm really excited about it because it looks really great," said Erin Conine, arts and events program specialist for the Olympia Parks, Arts and Recreation Department. "It's very vibrant, has a lot of color."
She said the city prides itself on having a diverse collection of art pieces, and this piece is unlike any others in the repertoire.
"This is something completely different," she said.
Kuhns was chosen by a jury that reviewed 34 applicants. She gets her materials from art classes, friends in the construction business who end up with extra tile, display boards from stores, and other places.
"When students in glass classes make mistakes, the glass is scrapped," she said of the glass she picks up.
Kuhns said she's done art as long as she can remember, but for a long time saw it as a hobby. She's done drawings, oils, pastels, ceramics, jewelry and other mediums.
But in 2000, Kuhns discovered mosaics and was hooked.
"One thing I like is it's ... almost therapeutic in taking something and busting it and breaking it and tearing it apart and piecing it together into something that is whole," she said, describing the finished forms as luminescent.
The designs she naturally tends toward did not render as well in other mediums as in mosaics, Kuhns added.
"When I'm doing designs, they tend to come naturally," she said. "Sometimes I go back to old drawings from a time when I was able to be an avid journal keeper and sketchbook keeper - when I had leisure time to sit and draw."
Kuhns has a 4-year-old daughter, and parenting makes it tough to spend long hours on such pastimes, she said. But motherhood also inspired her to take what she saw as a hobby and make it into a career. She tried working part-time after having her daughter, but discovered that even jobs with flexible hours required a lot of money for child care, cutting down her take-home pay to less than $300 a month.
"I decided to stop and go for the business," Kuhns said, noting she already had a business license but hadn't used it.
In February 2006, Kuhns took a business-training course through Enterprise for Equity, a nonprofit that helps people with limited incomes start and sustain small businesses. She developed a business plan and Web site, created artist contracts, and built a large art studio by the end of summer.
"I hoped to earn income for my family without being away and so much child care. In that way, motherhood was a motivating factor," she said.
Kuhns lives in the small town of Porter in East Grays Harbor County, where she works out of her recently built home studio. The studio has a play area for her daughter.
Kuhns said her mother inspired her as an artist. Some of her earliest memories are of her mom drawing while taking college art classes. Her mother minored in art.
"It's definitely something I've done as long as I can remember," she said.
She recalls taking Easter candy wrappers and making collages out of the foil.
"I was an only child," she said. "I lived in the middle of the woods. I really lived in my own head a lot. A lot of the way I saw the world I translated into art."
Arts walk XXXIV
What: The free twice-yearly festival's spring outing offers a lively mix of visual art by everyone from schoolchildren to Dale Chihuly, entertainment and great people-watching.
When: 5 to 10 p.m. Friday and noon to 7 p.m. Saturday
Where: Throughout downtown Olympia
More information: Call 360-753-8380. Maps and listings of venues and artists are available at participating downtown businesses and at The Olympia Center, 222 Columbia St. N.W., Olympia.
