Mary Zink Ohrazda

Mary Zink Ohrazda was a versatile artist who explored a wide range of media, including painting, print-making, ceramics, and soap-carving. Over the course of her career, she contributed to the arts community in Kansas City, Missouri, and received several awards for her creative accomplishments.

She was born on September 25, 1904, in New Albany, Indiana, but grew up in Parsons, Kansas, and Muskogee, Oklahoma, where her father worked as a railroad conductor. Ohrazda came to Kansas City during the 1930s to attend the Kansas City Art Institute. She studied under the city's leading artists, including Thomas Hart Benton, John De Martelly, Austin Ketcham and Mildred Welsh Hammond. Ohrazda won special recognition in Hammond's design and lettering class, earning a solo exhibition at the school's gallery. 

After graduating from the Kansas City Art Institute in 1939, she married Frank Ohrazda, a recent widower with young children. They moved to a farm in rural North Kansas City, where Ohrazda's creative practice flourished.

Mary Zink Ohrazda created portraits, illustrations, and prints using watercolor, oil, tempera, pastel, ink, and graphite. For many years, she worked as a professional illustrator, creating fashion illustrations alongside artists Edna Marie Dunn and Fanny Fern Fitzwater. In 1947, she copyrighted five original character designs, named "Mo," "Butch," "Mike," "Suzi" and "Toady." 

Ohrazda was equally comfortable with sculptural methods. In 1959, the Kansas City Star interviewed her in an article where she explained techniques for soap-carving, accompanied by photographs of her figurines. The same year, she exhibited two glazed busts of her grandchildren in the 1959 Heart of America Ceramic Exhibition. She won both the best in show award and first place in the hand modeling division. 

Ohrazda was an active community member and contributed to local arts organizations. She belonged to the Greater Kansas City Art Association and exhibited her work in local shows. She was a member of the Kansas City Athenaeum club, served as chairman of the Parkville Art and Literature Club, and belonged to the National League of American Pen Women.

Mary Zink Ohrazda died on April 8, 1987, in Kansas City, at the age of eighty-three.