Mikala holds Jasper at the family’s rural Bartholomew County home, which is served electrically by Bartholomew County REMC. Multi-talented Mikala is a straight-A student, plays volleyball and is also an accomplished marksman with a muzzleloader. Photo and stories by Richard G. Biever.

In Mikala Greenlee’s paintings, she mixes art with her heart and her mind.

“If you’re going to do something, do something that you have an interest in or you’d have fun painting or drawing,” Mikala advises other student artists. “They turn out better if you’re having fun doing them.”

For her, that combination produces works that are visually successful for all to see, and personally pleasing for the talented Hauser Jr.-Sr. High School eighth grader.

Inspired by her own Yorkshire Terrier, Jasper, Mikala’s 14×11-inch oil painting of a Yorkie puppy popping up from a wooden wheel barrow not only won the eighth grade division of the recently-judged student calendar art contest but also took the “Best of Show” honor from over 2,800 entries.

Mikala is the first eighth grader to earn the top honor and the third youngest in the contest’s 12 years. The painting, tying in the “Dog Days of Summer” along with some summer flowers, will illustrate August in the 2010 Cooperative Calendar of Student Art. The “Artist of the Year” honor earned Mikala an additional $100 prize to go with the $150 for winning her grade division.

For the painting, Mikala gathered multiple found images of Yorkies and wheel barrows. She combined them, working hard in her art class at school to “place” the dog in the wheel barrow.

Not satisfied that her composite sketch on canvas was good enough, she arranged Jasper in a similar pose in a basket at home, just to make sure the composition worked. She said she also kept reworking the dog’s front paws.

“She’s always challenged herself on the paintings,” said her dad, Brian. “When you think it’s really nice, she’s just not satisfied with it.”

Mikala’s dogged determination is shown with this year’s contest, too. She had entered the contest each year from first grade all the way through sixth grade. While she won an “Award of Merit” certificate each time, she never made it into the printed calendar. Last year, she missed the contest deadline.

This year, her art teacher at Hauser, Janeen Blomenberg, made sure she had something to send. Mrs. B, as she’s called by her students and their parents, was delighted when the call came letting her know Mikala was named Artist of the Year and noted Mikala’s talent and hard work.

Mrs. B has known of Mikala since she was a first grader. Mikala’s mom, Lana, a former art student of Blomenberg’s at Hauser, showed her some of Mikala’s early drawings. Mrs. B was immediately impressed with the natural talent. When Mikala was in fourth grade, Mrs. B arranged to have Mikala walk across the sidewalk from Hope Elementary to the high school to take special advanced art classes with her.

Those lessons continued over the years, and now Mikala is taking high-school level art when her eighth grade classmates are in a study hall.

This year Mrs. B suggested Mikala try painting a dog for the contest. “I had done a wolf,” Mikala said. “I like doing the different textures on animals, so I wanted to try a Yorkie.”

To complete the work, she wanted to add some August-blooming flowers. She turned to her grandmother who suggested marigolds and impatiens. That’s the kind of thought and attention to detail that also marks Mikala’s works.

With her dad’s encouragement, the straight-A student has been randomly photographing tree bark, rocks, grass and other natural textures she might want to use in future paintings to help her add realism.

Along with instructions from Mrs. B, Mikala has had classes with local Hope artist Rena Dillman. “Rena helps me with the painting,” Mikala said. “Mrs. B helps me with the positioning, and she has me try to branch out.”

Her parents noted Mrs. B has a way of getting their daughter to push herself, challenging her to do better by simply encouraging her “to put more Mikala” into her work. When she accepts the challenge, “It usually works out for the better,” Mikala agreed.

Mikala has won other awards in art, including recognition in a national wildlife art contest sponsored by the National Rifle Association.

She’s also talented in other areas: she plays on the school’s travel volleyball squad, writes poetry and is a champion muzzleloading marksman.

The Greenlee family, which includes older brother Morgan and younger sisters Maclyn and Michal, participate in the shooting competitions and other activities at the national muzzleloader gatherings in Friendship, Ind. There, Mikala and Maclyn have raised money raffling off Mikala’s art. Half of the proceeds they gave back to the muzzleloading range.

Mikala said she hopes to make art her career and some day own a gallery. But for someone like Mikala, whose other favorite subject is math, the future is a blank canvas to be painted however she fancies. As she enters and completes high school in the coming years, she’ll no doubt continue finding success by just putting “more Mikala” into whatever she pursues.