Waltke’s favorite theme is realism, including a focus on birds, wildlife, botanicals, abstracts, and miniatures. She believes, “fine art belongs everywhere: where we work, where we play, in our homes and in our everyday experience.” Waltke is an accomplished photographer, taking most of her own reference photos in the field. Having exhibited locally and nationally, she takes pride and pleasure in donating her art to charities for their annual benefits and fundraisers.

Waltke has lived in Arizona most of her life. According to her, “I’ve lived in and traveled throughout the world, but I always enjoy coming home to the Sonoran Desert where I feel enormously inspired by the many intimate life forms such as: fierce agave spines, furry noses, iridescent feathers, and sparkling luminescent cactus flower petals. There is always an artistic opportunity happening somewhere around my home with: cactus wrens hatching, snakes shedding, tarantula hawk wasps circling after a rain, resident bobcats calling out their territory, woodpeckers gleaning, hummingbirds sucking nectar from desert flowers, coyotes howling, or monsoons powering through a summer afternoon.” Some years ago, Waltke also discovered the intense beauty of Colorado, capturing the abundant wildflowers, wildlife and birds, and the occasional plein air. More recently, she has traveled to British Columbia, Canada, discovering yet more birds and wildlife and vistas.

Exhibitions/Galleries:

2022	•Ironwood Gallery AZ Sonora Desert Museum Artists For Conservation 2022 Touring Show, Tucson, AZ •Artists For Conservation 2022 Van Dusen Botanical Garden Vancouver, BC, CAN
2021	•Untitled Gallery Small Works @ Untitled Gallery Tucson, AZ •Baldwin Educational Center Gallery ASDM Student Show Tucson, AZ
2020	•Little Gallery @ De Grazia Gallery in the Sun, Take a Walk On the Wild Side with Muriel Timmins Tucson, AZ
2019	•Artists for Conservation 2019 Festival Van Dusen Botanical Garden Vancouver, BC, Canada
2018	•Vancouver Convention Center Artists for Conservation Foundation 27th IOC Vancouver, BC, Canada
2017	•Ironwood Gallery Arizona Sonora Desert Museum Art Institute Annual Student Show Tucson, AZ
2015	•Fox Tucson Theatre Bennuval OSIRIS-REx Mission Celebration Tucson, AZ •University of Arizona Lunar & Planetary Laboratory, The Art of Planetary Science, Tucson, AZ •Little Gallery @ De Grazia Gallery in the Sun, Art of the Southwest...and More, Tucson, AZ
2014	•University of Arizona, Lunar & Planetary Laboratory, The Art of Planetary Science, Tucson, AZ •Starr Pass Resort, Division for Planetary Science of American Astronomical Society, Tucson, AZ •Phoenix Airport Museum, Full Bloom, Phoenix, AZ
2013	•Phoenix Airport Museum, Birds, Blooms and Bugs, Phoenix, AZ •Leigh Yawkey Woodson Art Museum, Birds in Art, Wausau, WI •Empire 100 Western Art Show and Sale, Tucson, AZ
2012	•Leigh Yawkey Woodson Art Museum, Birds in Art, Wausau, WI
2011	•Mountain Oyster Club 42nd Annual Contemporary Western Art Show, Tucson, AZ •Cushing Arts in the Barn, with David Footer, artist, Cushing, Maine •Northern Trust, “Art of the Alum & Friends”, CHS Foundation, Tucson, AZ
2010	•Agua Caliente Ranch House Gallery, Four Hands Show, Tucson, AZ •Long Gallery Academy Village, Images of Nature & Imaginings Solo Show, Tucson, AZ
2009	•Ironwood Gallery, Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum Art Institute Student Show & Graduation, Tucson, AZ •Ironwood Gallery, ASDM, Cactus & Succulents Art Show, Tucson •Ironwood Gallery, ASDM, “Imagine That!”, Tucson, AZ
2008 - 2005	•Ironwood Gallery, ASDM Art Institute, Annual Student Show, Tucson, AZ
2002	•Sedona Art Center, CPSA 9th Annual Juried Exhibition, Sedona, AZ
2000	•Shemer Art Museum, 7th Annual Exhibition of Colored Pencil Works by Arizona Artists, Phoenix, AZ