Originally from the East Coast, Kristina grew up splitting her time between the US and Canada, where her extended family still lives. She received her BFA in Painting from Richmond University in London. She also studied art history at University of British Columbia (Vancouver) and illustration and design at California College of the Arts (San Francisco).

Since 2000, when she settled in California, she dove into work as an arts advocate and eventually as Executive Director at Arts Council Napa Valley, art teacher, gallery manager and curator. During this time, she also kept a working studio and showed her work in numerous exhibitions throughout the Bay Area. Her work is represented in the di Rosa Center for Contemporary Art (Napa) among many other private collections.

Today, she continues to create paintings, mosaics and large-scale murals for private and commercial clients while maintaining her commitment to arts advocacy.

KLY the what?

You can call me KLY, you can call me K.Y., or you can call me Kristina.

K-L-Y are my initials (middle name Lynn) and growing up, my family sometimes called me KLY. One year I had to learn to swim butterfly for my neighborhood swim team medley race. Knowing I was nervous, my dad cheered me on with his new nickname for me, "KLY the FLY".

I liked it and began using it to sign all my masterpieces. It gave me a kind of anonymity and lent, to my teenage mind, a level of sophisticated cachet. I took the butterfly as my totem animal and the name stuck.