Bio

Born August 11, l951 in Endicott, NY, Kristy Higby received her bachelor’s degree in Studio Art from the University of South Carolina and has taught book arts, drawing, and digital arts since 1977.

She has attended numerous workshops at the International Film and Photography Workshops in Rockport, Maine; the Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University in Durham, N.C., and Penland School of Crafts in Penland, N.C.

Her short documentary, Flag Day, received a juror’s honorable mention at the 2005 AFI/Discovery Channel SILVERDOCS Documentary Conference and Filmfest held in Silver Spring, Md; a Jury’s Citation at the 25th Black Maria Film and Video Festival in Jersey City, NJ, Best Documentary at the Dam Short Film Festival in Boulder City, Nevada, and Best Activist Film at the San Francisco Women in Film Festival ’07. It has screened in over 30 film festivals to date.

Flag Day was chosen by W.W. Norton for inclusion on a Norton Sociology DVD. The DVD was created in the Spring 2007.  It will be included with following textbooks, Introduction to Sociology and Essentials of Sociology by Anthony Giddens, Mitchell Duneier and Richard Appelbaum, The Real World: An Introduction to Sociology by Kerry Ferris and Jill Stein and You May Ask Yourself: An Introduction to Sociology by Dalton Conley, due to publish in 2008. The Norton Sociology DVD will contain approximately 22 short clips (4 to 7 minutes each) on important sociology concepts.

Her short documentary, Bowl Digger, received a Director’s Choice award at the 2007 Black Maria Film Festival and a Best Documentary award at the 2007 Dam Short Film Festival in Boulder City, Nevada. It has screened in 13 Film Festivals and art museums to date. It was juried into the 3-month long Make it New exhibition at the Asheville Art Museum, Asheville, NC, during the summer of 2007 and also will tour with the 2007-2008 Short Circuit Traveling Film Festival Sponsored by the Southern Arts Federation.

Her latest documentary, Cornie, was completed in May, 2007 and is an official selection of the 20^th Annual Dallas Film Festival to screen on August 5.

She has presented and participated in numerous visual arts workshops, including workshops taken with prominent Book & Paper Artists, Susan Share, Nance O’Banion, Chris Rolik, Bonnie Stahlecker, and Jim Croft. Awards include Individual Artists Fellowship Award, SC Arts Commission; South Carolina Arts Commission Small Grant Award; Zearn Award for Outstanding Teaching, Mercersburg Academy, Mercersburg, Pa; and most recently, Judges’ Commendation for Excellence in Structure, Imagery & Content, Book Explorations 2001, The New Art Forum; Honorable Mention, Steamboat Springs Arts Council’s Winter Works 2002 Exhibition; and Judges’ Commendation for Excellence in Structure, Imagery & Content, Book Explorations 2002 and the Washington County Museum of Art, Annual Exhibition, Honorable Mention, Painting, 2004, Hagerstown, MD. Juror’s Honorable Mention at the 2005 AFI/Discovery Channel SILVERDOCS Conference and Filmfest held in Silver Springs, Md.

Her work was included in Art of the Book 2002, University of Indianapolis, Christel Dehaan Fine Arts Gallery; Post This; Critic’s Choice, Studio Gallery, Washington, DC; Jazz Improvisations, Target Gallery, Washington, DC; the Elizabethtown College September 11th Memorial Exhibition; Third Biennial Women Book Artists' Exhibition at Miliken Gallery, Converse College, Spartanburg, SC; An Open Book Art Exhibit, Cuyahoga Communicty College, Cleveland, Ohio; Matter ans Spirit; the Genesis and Evolution of the Book, Wells College Book Arts Center, Aurora, New York; and Structures, Surfaces and Content: Contemporary Book Forms, Kauffman Gallery, Huber Art Center, Shippensburg Univ, Shippensburg, PA, 2004, More Than Words Can Say: A Celebration of Book Arts, Traveling Show, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC 2005; Cover to Cover, Maryland Federation of Art City Gallery, Pyramid Atlantic Art Center, Baltimore, Maryland 2006; A Comfortable Place, two-person Exhibition, Warner Gallery, Holbrook Arts Center, Millbrook School, Millbrook, NY 2006; Alumni Invitational Exhibition, McMaster Gallery, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC, 2006. Her work is included in the upcoming Southern Arts Federation Exhibition American Masterpiece Craft Exhibition opening in New Orleans in September, 2007. 

Higby and her husband, Mark Flowers, a painter, divide their time between Mercersburg, Pa. and Asheville, NC. They had a two-person exhibition, Related Separates, at the Goodall Gallery in Columbia College, Columbia, SC and another two-person exhibition, Sequences and Events, at the Myrtle Beach Museum, Myrtle Beach, SC in August 2006.

Their oldest son, Carson, graduated from Mercersburg Academy in 2001 and lives in Oakland, California. Their other son, Morgan, graduated in 2003 and attends the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.