Mother of two Shirley Kaci was born in North London and relocated to Hertfordshire at the age of nine. A self taught artist, a feisty character with a heart of gold, always willing and wanting to give to a worthy cause.
Shirley’s life has been a real rollercoaster, so to ease the bumps in the road she used art as a means of expressing her most deepest emotional turmoil. She discovered her true artistic ability to create after the loss of her third child in 1989 and found art to be a potent therapy. She was referred to psychotherapy twice, 1989-1991 and 2014-19. Her first solo exhibition was in her local library followed by her second solo show in 1992, partnering with E.H.M.A, (East Herts Miscarriage Association) an association she was keen to promote. She raised funds for their charity and was filmed by Cable Television. There were other T.V appearances between 1995-2000, a one-to-one interview with Kathleen Holloway UK Living, focusing on shirley’s art and miscarriages and a part in a series with the BBC “Bare Necessities”.
Aged 31, Shirley did her first GCSE English, A/S in Art, and Social Science as part of her Access to HE. She was nominated by two local art groups to be their exhibition organiser/coordinator, and curated several exhibitions for them. Shirley submitted work to the UK’s largest open exhibition at Alexandra Palace. During the exhibition, some of the artists work were stolen and many were misplaced. Shirley became the first point of call and coordinated artists complaints, successfully managed to find the whereabouts of many missing paintings by facilitating an article in the artist and illustrators magazine as well as the Independent Newspaper. She created a large backdrop for the Bloomsbury Theatre and her work was also displayed alongside the great Marc Chagall during a touring exhibition of his work at the Farnham Maltings.
After the birth of Shirley’s daughter she opened an Art Gallery, a new platform to promote her and other artists work. When she closed her gallery she lived in a refuge with her children. She went onto study construction trades gaining three NVQs in bricklaying, interior decorating and horticulture which was achieved in record time. Being the only female bricklayer left on site, the direction she’d thought she was going in all changed. Shirley was introduced to CEO Andy Hill, Property Developer at Hill Partnerships LTD who she trained with and began a 10 year partnership supplying them with bespoke greeting cards and two series of four miniature sculptures, which graced the shelves of hundreds of interior offices in and around the UK. She partnered with Hill’s to produce 100 limited edition prints of which the proceeds of sales were donated to the charity crisis.
Shirley’s latest joint venture is her and her daughters new brand of clothing and homeware products.
You can see and purchase Shirley and Poppy’s Clothing, accessories, Surface Patterns and Homeware Products at https://kacikit.com/
Shirley has just recently partnered with the well established Bags of Love online gifting company giving them another platform to sell their products all of which are handmade to order in the UK and drop shipped worldwide by Bags Of Love. To visit our Bags of Love Shop please click on the link below.
https://www.bagsoflove.co.uk/stores/kaci-kit
If you would like to join Shirley’s Facebook group please click on the link below.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/1169359240115954/