A Steady Hand

Trust and consistency are two values that guide Sharon Kiefer’s life.

“To be trustworthy means you do what you say, and say what you do,” said Kiefer, curator of exhibitions for the Perkins Center for the Arts. “No matter what, try to make that happen. Also, be consistent with everything: your family, kids, job, tasks, chores, bills, spending, friendships … It takes work, but respect is gained by being the person who can be counted upon.”

That philosophy grounds her work curating more than 20 exhibitions each year across the Moorestown and Collingswood locations as well as an off-site venue. Founded in Moorestown in 1977, the nonprofit community arts organization expanded to a second location in Collingswood in 2002. Today, it offers arts education, exhibitions, and inclusive cultural programming. The Moorestown location contains a single gallery, while Collingswood features both a main gallery and a loft space.

“It’s a wonderful feeling to present an artist’s work and to listen to their stories through their artwork,” Kiefer said. “Meeting artists at various stages of their artistic journey is a privilege, whether it is their first opportunity or one that encapsulates the artists’ entire life’s work.

“That is an extremely important role to play for the gallery.”  

In addition to organizing exhibitions and discovering and championing artists, Kiefer sees curators as connectors who use artists’ stories to bring communities together and spark learning through cultural and historical exploration. She enjoys highlighting diverse perspectives and presenting a range of artistic mediums that might pique the interest of viewers.

She is also passionate about sharing the mission of the “Arts in Healing” initiative, launched by the Perkins Center in partnership with the Samaritan Hospice Center in Voorhees, which invites visitors to engage with art in ways that can support mental and physical well-being.

Kiefer was raised as an only child in a rural part of Pottstown, Pennsylvania. She attended Pottsgrove High School where she played field hockey and ran track and was surrounded by farms and fields. When she was young, she played outside daily and enjoyed nature to its fullest. Growing up, Kiefer thought she would do something creative or teach, but she knew she would live on a farm someday. Horseback riding was one of her favorite hobbies.

Kiefer graduated with a bachelor’s degree in design and merchandising from Drexel University in Philadelphia. She attended Millersville University, where she studied elementary education. She also received a teaching certificate for K-8 and an art teacher certification for K-12 from Stockton University.

After a decade in Philadelphia, Kiefer made a full-circle journey back to a rural way of life on a 360-acre farm in New Jersey, raising sheep, chickens, dogs, cats, and five children. Her mom, Ginny Pickell, and stepdad, Walt, live in Boyertown, Pennsylvania. Her biological father, David Leonard, is deceased. She also has three stepbrothers.

“My children are my world and have given me the greatest gift in life — motherhood,” she said, of her son and four daughters. (Kiefer also has three granddaughters.) “Just watching them grow, becoming amazing adults, doing amazing things … They are the bravest people I know. It has been a privilege to be part of their lives.”

Kiefer began working with the Perkins Center for the Arts in September 2020. She was originally hired to curate six yearly shows. During her transition to full-time work at the center, the scope of Kiefer’s work grew to curating 18 in-house exhibitions with two additional curations at Samaritan Hospice Center in Voorhees.

Perkins partnered with Samaritan to launch the Arts in Healing initiative, which aims to offer comfort and tranquility to families and staff navigating the profound challenges of end-of-life care. Other notable developments to the exhibitions department in the past five years include the Docent Program at the Collingswood location, student field trips and artist talks at the exhibit receptions. As the department expanded, Kiefer was happy to gain an assistant, Mandee Hamill, who writes and records the QR audio tours for the galleries and the slideshows for visitors with special needs or disabilities to view the exhibitions from the first floors. She also oversees inventory for Perkins’ two cash-n-carry stops located at each gallery site featuring work by Perkins’ faculty.

Kiefer believes in the measurable benefits of art. Recent studies have shown that viewing art and participating in crafting projects can increase feelings of calm, lower blood pressure, and contribute to a sense of belonging. Art can help viewers make sense of emotions. The idea that the arts can be used prescriptively as part of a comprehensive care model is becoming more relevant, she emphasized.  A “prescription” for a gallery visit, or concert, or class, after an accident, injury, or sickness is becoming recognized as a benefit for patient care.

Every exhibition and artist is different, but she falls in love with each one she presents. Shows that have been especially meaningful to Kiefer include Beverly McCutcheon’s powerful installation about Black domestic workers in the 1950’s and installing the last exhibitions of artists with long careers in the arts such as Tom Gaines, Henri Meillier and Jack Lardis. Or “Threaded,” a show that featured, among others, the artist/seamstress Sara Bunn and her depiction of colonial royalty through traditional Black textile patterns and colonial-style bustle dresses. The shows done in collaboration with the New Jersey Folklife at the Perkins Center are powerful, she added, in that contemporary art mediums combine with traditional craft practices.

She enjoys presenting exhibitions that showcase an artist’s talent and loves when an aspect of a show — like Marc Opdycke’s alien masks in the “Space in Art” exhibition — engages the whole family. She believes a curator should absolutely love art as a lifestyle.

“I like to tell my daughters to use every job, life experience, and connection as a stepping stone towards pursuing a meaningful future,” Kiefer said. “Landing the dream job where you’re growing, learning, and you love what you do is the icing on the cake.”

She said that her experiences after graduating from Drexel University — including her co-op work in an advertising office, completing store installations, and peforming styling work in a Philadelphia photography studio — helped her develop skills that she referred back to later in her career endeavors.

Getting married and moving to South Jersey led her to pursue elementary-teaching and art teacher certifications. Teaching fifth grade while serving as an office manager for a newly formed nursery business allowed her to pursue motherhood, and eventually step away from teaching for a bit to raise her children. Kiefer said she learned a lot from teaching that she later applied to her life as a mom, such as classroom management skills and behavioral management techniques.

Ceramic is Kiefer’s medium of choice. She’s been in the same book club for 26 years. She does yoga every morning and loves wine from France. She’s travelled to China, Hong Kong, London, Paris, Mexico, Hawaii, California, Iceland, and six Caribbean Islands. She witnessed the northern lights and the midnight sun. Her favorite quote is from her mother: “Make your bed first thing every morning, it’s the first win of the day.”

Looking ahead, she’s excited for Perkins’ Members and Faculty Show, now in its 39th year, to be held in May.

“I live by the laws of nature,” Kiefer said. “I follow the sun for sleep and the seasons for hibernation and outside time. I hope to treat people how I would like to be treated. I try to laugh a lot and use humor to make people around me feel better. I try not to live in the past too much, and like the clean-slate idea at the start of each day.”