About Denise Porthun Jankauskas

I have lived in Queens, NY all my life. For as long as I can remember, I've been wanting to create visual art: from first grade macaroni art to second grade bring-in-your-dad's-old-shirt-for-a-smock tempera painting, to high school, painting denim jackets with Led Zepplin and Asia album covers, and murals on friends' bedroom walls to make a little bit of $$.

I grew up in Woodhaven, a small neighborhood in Queens. I received my Bachelor of Fine Arts from The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science & Art in New York City. It was pretty intense.

My husband and I now live in Glendale, another small neighborhood in Queens, less than 2 miles from where we grew up–he's from Woodhaven, too. Incidentally, we grew up three blocks from each other and didn't meet for twenty years.

During and after college, I was a photo librarian at Time Inc. until 1998. Although sometimes a bit dry, the job afforded me a myriad of visual inspiration by being immersed in over twenty million images. Then, from 1998-2005, I was an editorial art director for a trade-magazine publisher in NYC. Now I'm a nearly-full-tiime freelancer at Gigantic Inc. in SoHo; the principal of the company is also from Woodhaven - we grew up on the same block! Concurrently, I've been freelancing graphic design services and developing fine art on the side. I'm proud that after all these years, I've been able to make a living out of incorporating visual art in one form or another.

My fine art and photographs are displayed in private collections around the country: Anaheim, CA; Hartford, CT; Fairfield, CT; Stamford, CT; Chicago, IL; Blue Springs, MO; Apex, NC; Calabash, NC; Charlotte, NC; Garner, NC; Westwood, NJ; Bronx, NY; Brooklyn, NY; Forest Hills, NY; Massapequa, NY; Middle Village, NY; Wingdale, NY; Woodhaven, NY; Virgina Beach, VA; and Fort Ashby, WV.

Thanks for taking the time to look at my work and at my site!