Wildlife artist Kat McCall left a legacy that still breathes ¡ª an enduring love of the natural world shared by her children and all who cherished her work.
Story by Cara Clark
On canvas, a German Shorthaired Pointer stands poised, one paw lifted to signal a covey. Every mottled spot on his liver-and-white coat seems to tremble with the tension of the moment — so focused is he on the gamebirds, so vividly alive in paint. In another work, a quail bursts upward, each feather and wisp of down captured with such precision that the bird appears suspended between stillness and flight, life pulsing through its plump form as it takes to the skies. Such was the remarkable artistry of the late Kat McCall, who died on September 27, 2024, after being struck by a tree felled by Hurricane Helene. She was only 62.
When news spread of artist Katherine Barnett McCall’s passing, the loss rippled far beyond her family’s circle. Her vibrant watercolors of birds, flowers, and Southern landscapes had long captured the delicate balance of beauty and nature — but it was her warmth and presence that people remembered most.
“It was amazing to see how many people turned out for her service,” says Ann Campbell-Kelly, studio and creative director for Kat McCall Papers. “I mean, it was just, we were gobsmacked. I feel like they said it was over 900 people. But then we weren't really surprised — because Kat knew everybody, loved to connect with people. We thought, ‘Wow,’ but were not surprised.”
The Augusta, Georgia, artist had a love of nature that began early and ran deep, nurtured by both her curiosity and her education.
“She always loved the outdoors,” Ann recalls. “She attended Converse College in Spartanburg, South Carolina, and got a degree in biology, and so that really helped inspire her more, because she did love nature so much. Kat’s three essentials of life — relationships, art, and the natural world — were at the heart of everything she did. She always wanted to encourage all three of those things.”
From Nurse to Artist, from Mother to Mentor
Kat’s journey from nurse to artist was gradual but inevitable. After years of raising her two sons, she began to devote more time to her art — first photography, then watercolors.
“She was doing photography because she was an avid photographer,” Ann says. “And I know she was painting as far back as, like, 2014… she did watercolor magic.”
Her son Mac, now an attorney in New York, remembers those formative years vividly.
“When we were young, we grew up in Newnan, outside of Atlanta,” he says. “A lot of the time, we were living out in the country in a farmhouse, and she was homeschooling. One of the biggest things she did for us when we were kids was to very actively encourage an interest in the outdoors — being attentive to the natural world and writing nature journals. From the time that we were probably in third or fourth grade, I became a very passionate birder.”
That early passion became a lifelong bond between mother and son. “It led to some cool opportunities for us to do things together,” Mac recalls. “I remember about three years ago… she was doing paintings for a couple down in Skidaway Island. I was with her, and we just went birding… we identified the birds that were out there, and then she ended up painting a series of paintings for them.”
Kat’s ability to nurture extended far beyond her family.
“She decided to homeschool us because she wanted us to grow up to be independent, strong thinkers,” Mac explains. “She brought us up reading all the time, reading anything we could get our hands on, of all kinds of different views. She trained us to be critical thinkers. The strength of what she gave me has really defined the course of my life.”
Even in the most minor details — her garden, her writing, her art — Kat’s attentiveness to life’s beauty shone through. In Newnan, she wrote a column called "The Thoughtful Gardener," where she explored flowers and plants with the same depth she brought to her paintings.
