Barbara Schmid-Egr, a born and raised Midwestern girl, always loved creating art, reading, and searching for fairies in her back yard. As a child, she would use pen and ink, copying drawings from her grandmother’s dictionary. She attended Omaha’s Central High School because of its close locale to Joslyn Art Museum. She studied art throughout high school and attended every art opening Joselyn offered with her classmates.

After graduation, she joined a local art club and studied oil painting with a local artist. Several years later, Ms. Schmid-Egr earned a commercial art degree from Metro Tech Community College, and she worked in the field for various local companies.

Although Barbara eventually became an elementary school teacher, she never stopped painting! In 2002, the artist held a one-woman show at a local lawn and garden shop. There, she displayed thirteen paintings - all geraniums. A friend asked her to read a book, Everyday Sacred: A Woman's Journey Home, by Sue Bender. One of the book's essays described an art teacher who presented her students with The 100 Drawing Project. This assignment challenged art students to choose an ordinary subject to draw, sculpt, photograph, or paint. The purpose of making 100 pieces of art, all the same subject, was to allow the emergence of the artists' styles. For the next ten years, Barbara painted only geraniums. She hit a wall at geranium painting #71! She could no longer paint geraniums, because she was sick of painting that subject, but she recognized her artistic style was all about COLOR!!!!!

Today, Barbara enjoys living in Bellevue with her husband and Joe Cocker, the family pooch. She displays her art, and serves as president of The Passageway Gallery located in Omaha’s Old Market, and serves as Omaha Artist’s Inc. Art Club’s president. Often, Schmid-Egr participates in Omaha Art Pop’s shows around town. She has been awarded several awards and attended Tim Horn’s June, 2018 plein air workshop in Cincinnati.