‘Chicago chalk champ’ wows Safari kids with her creation

Kathleen J. Roling has a soft spot for making children happy. The Des Moines chalk artist, a protege of “Chicago chalk champ” Shaun Hays, drove two and a half hours out to the Carnegie Cultural Center on Wednesday to chalk a 3D illusory image from Aesop’s Fables, even as rain clouds threatened.“Once it’s done and they can get their picture on it, it’s interactive art, which children enjoy, and it always just makes me happy, which is why I came over here,’” Roling said. She was sketching the tortoise crossing the finish line from “The Tortoise and the Hare.” (The art was later protected from the rain with a tarp.)She studied graphic design post-high school. Upon entering the field though she “kind of hated it. … The commercial thing didn’t sit right with me,” Roling said.— For more on this story, see the Aug. 21 New Hampton Tribune.