Life & Work
Jane Hart
Also published as Jane Marks
Three careers and one lifelong habit. Jane was a magazine journalist and the author of five books. She became a board-certified art therapist and brought art into New York’s prisons. And through all of it, she painted.
I. The Writer
Before art therapy, Jane worked as a journalist. Her writing appeared in Glamour, Mademoiselle, Seventeen, Parents, Ladies’ Home Journal, The New York Times and Town & Country. Writing as Jane Marks, she published five books.
Selected books
- The Hidden Children: The Secret Survivors of the Holocaust
- We Have a Problem: A Parents’ Sourcebook
- Stop Screaming: How some of us made it through Covid-19
- The Newer Normal
II. The Art Therapist
Jane left journalism to earn a master’s degree in art therapy, which she has called “a gift for me because of my own painting.”
- Credentials
- MA, ATR-BC, LCAT
- Sing Sing
- Led the first art therapy group in a New York State men’s maximum-security prison
- Westchester
- Brought art therapy to the Westchester County jail
- Vermont
- Art therapy with residents of a shelter for teenage girls
- Practice
- Her art therapy clients have included hospice patients, incarcerated people, bereaved children, cancer survivors and troubled teenage girls.
“My job is to support their creativity, which in turn supports them and their well-being.”
III. The Portrait Artist
Jane works in oil, acrylic, pen and pencil. Her portraits range from beloved animals to family and friends, and she often meets her sitters before beginning.
Exhibitions
- Sugar, Sweat & Stone: Art & History
- Together Apart
- Artwork donated to the “Restart the Arts” Gala Auction
- Selected artist (Phase 2), Riverwalk Community Mural
Recognition
- Award-winning portraitist
IV. The Daily Artist
Every morning, Jane makes a new drawing. Her own description: whimsical, but “full of emotion, too, and full of fun.” Every one of them is kept in the archive.
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