Cynthia Shaffer is engaged in many different sectors of the art field. After graduating from Columbia College Chicago with a degree in commercial art, she worked as a graphic designer, illustrator and art director for magazines in Chicago, Phoenix and Fort Lauderdale. While raising a family with her husband Todd she began painting murals, doing freelance logo design, sold pencil illustrations for greeting cards and learned henna tattooing.

An obsession with the beauty of the natural world informs another avenue of her artistic expression. Cindy collects bones, bugs, feathers, fish scales, seed pods and every cool, creepy dead thing she finds, along with deconstructed man made items, then arranges them in precise formations to lure the viewer into seeing the elements as objects of beauty.

Cindy’s work was showcased in a three artist show entitled “Earthborn” at le Poire Gallery in Crafton, PA and has been included in many other Pittsburgh area exhibitions. She has curated two shows for Sweetwater Art Center, “In the Belly of the Beast” and “Wild Things” for which 15’ tall inflatable tentacles waved on the building’s roof. In a competition to promote the National League Baseballs’s 2007 All Star Game held in Pittsburgh, artists were asked to design something on a plywood star that honored the city. Cindy fabricated a 4’ star for the Phipps Conservatory of a rose using prototype color changing PPG Paint, and an 8’ relief sculpture star of an octopus and other aquatic creatures for the Pittsburgh Zoo that won first prize and is permanently installed in the zoo’s aquarium.

While working on various projects Cindy consistently does two things: teaching and volunteering. She has taught at White House Studios, Sweetwater Art Center and Contemporary Crafts Pittsburgh with classes for young students, disabled students, the elderly and even retired nuns. She created a class called Wild Animal Art in which she brings in a live animal, educates the students about that animal, then teaches a themed art project in various mediums. Cindy has volunteered for Gilda’s Club, teaching art classes to cancer survivors, and the National Aviary, educating visitors about the exhibits. She has been caring for native Pennsylvania wildlife at the Humane Animal Rescue Wildlife Rehabilitation Center since 2004, including fostering neonatal opossum, and has been taking photos of homeless cats and dogs for the Butler County Humane Society since 2003, posting their pictures through Petfinder to aid in their adoption.

Cindy lives in Wexford, PA with her husband Todd and their spoiled pets.