Laurha Frankfort, 1974

LAURHA LauRha has enjoyed a 40-year career as a multi-media artist. A native of New York, LauRha relocated to Arizona where she fell in love with the desert. LauRha focuses much of her time creating line drawings, capturing the pure line of the three-dimensional body along with her love and respect of the female form. She also pursues many of her other life-long passions: music, teaching and healing. When she was just nine years old, LauRha began playing clarinet. She then moved on to the saxophones, bass clarinet, and flute. She had some of the finest music teachers in New York City to thank for her Classical and Jazz training. At the age of 15, she began giving music lessons to students at the primary school level and has continued teaching until this day. Accepted into the music school of Indiana University in Bloomington, LauRha was a Classical Clarinet major, double minor in Jazz Sax and Print Making (Intaglio, lithography and silk screening). While at university, she added piano and guitar to her list of instruments mastered. After returning to New York, she continued playing in clubs and studying music. She went on to hone her improvising skills while studying with renowned blind pianist and Jazz performer, Lennie Tristano. Her love of art also began when she was a child. Her grandfather taught her to appreciate the beauty of nature and to admire the work of the masters while exploring the Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Whitney and many other museums of note. When she was just 13 years old, she studied at the Art Students League, under Marshal Glasier, where she learned the power of an "honest line." Her love of art continued through high school and university. After attending Indiana University, she returned to New York to study art at The New School, Parson's School of Design and the Fashion Institute of Technology. She studied silk screening, children's book illustration, graphic design, etching, figuring drawing and dyes and fabric sciences. She eventually became a partner in a silk screening business and grew that company into one of the nation's largest manufacturers of music tee shirts and sweats. As most of the silk screeners spoke Spanish, she mastered another art form, language, and learned Spanish to better communicate with them. Currently she shows her art in Galleries in Scottsdale AZ, Sedona AZ, and Sausalito, CA. At the age of thirty, she moved to Arizona where she discovered another passion - Qi Gong. Qi Gong emphasizes natural and holistic healing and is the technique of building, increasing and directing the energy of the body, mind and spirit. She continues to study with Qi Gong Grand Master Hong Liu and after fourteen years of instruction has become one of only five certified teachers in the Valley of the Sun. She teaches at her home and in Hospitals, Doctors Offices, and Health Clubs around the Valley. LauRha incorporates all of her passions on a daily basis. She teaches music to students and plays in bands throughout the Valley; she writes music; she creates drawings focusing on the power of the female form; and she studies and teaches the ancient healing practice of Qi Gong. She lives in Paradise Valley with her husband John, a Family Physician, her Golden Retriever Tyler, and cat Pyewacket. “Hi, I'm LauRha. Welcome to my Multi-Media website. Come in and experience fine art, music and healing. I welcome the universal language of vibrations, resonating through different mediums. I am freed by music, I am empowered by writing, I am healed by Qi Gong, I am high on figure drawing! I love drawing and painting the nude! The body: what power, what grand energy exudes from it! On my canvas I feel the smooth flow of light and movement: One chance, the pure line, the improvised solo, the Qi Gong state, Being in the moment, absorbed in the creative force. My art and music are healing and nurturing. I want to make art that speaks of balance and different energy vibrations, whispering to our senses and emotions that all is well. All is well. Thank you all my teachers. I will teach till I leave this planet. I will give back what I received. Thank you God for giving me the strength and inspiration to help all your creatures, both two and four legged.”