About

Hishaw’s artistic perspective is shaped by more than 20 years of working alongside farmers, ranchers, and rural communities confronting land loss, environmental change, and the preservation of family legacies. Her family’s history of land loss in Oklahoma further influences how she interprets the relationship between people, property, memory, and place.

Since the 1990’s, Hishaw’s early creative work was rooted in poetry. From 2007 to 2009, she served as a City Literary Arts Coach for teens participating in Brave New Voices, an international youth poetry slam and festival. In 2008, the team advanced to the semifinals at the Brave New Voices competition in Washington, D.C. This experience strengthened her belief in art as a means of giving voice to personal history, community, and lived experience.

Her connection between art and conservation extends throughout her creative career. In 2010, her photograph “Taylor’s Scared of Horse” received Honorable Mention in the Agriculture/Conservation Across America category of the Jackson County Soil & Water Conservation District photography competition. In 2023, Hishaw was a Featured Poet with Writing the Land, a Nature Culture project connecting poets with protected lands and using poetry to deepen awareness of conservation, place, nature, and the human relationship with land. In 2026, her oil painting “Eating Crow” (seen above) was selected for the Third Annual Root 2 Fruit Festival in Philadelphia.