Page 61 - South Mississippi Living - January, 2025

Ellen Reeves
has two main passions in
life – art and rescuing animals, especially cats. The Gulfport resident puts her heart into both.
She was born in 1942 on a Danish island when her parents fled Germany. Her mother was Lutheran but her father was Jewish. “We had to get away from the war otherwise everyone would’ve been killed but we all survived,” she recalls. “By birth I’m Dan- ish but I was raised in Germany and have also lived in Israel.”
Her journey to Mississippi began when she met a young Navy Petty Officer while vacationing in Greece with her sister in the 1960s. She and the Navy man were married and eventually came to the United States after several postings in various Euro- pean countries. They landed first in Connecticut and later came to Mississippi.
Art has been a part of the 82-year-old's life for many years. “I started painting when I was 11 years old because it is in my fam- ily. My grandmother was quite a well-known artist in Denmark,” she says. “It skipped my mother's generation but my sister and I were gifted to be able to paint.”
Reeves recalls winning her first honorable mentions when she was 11 and 12 years old in Germany. She says she's not actually self taught but art is in her blood. To further her education she attended the University for Performing and Visual Arts in Kiel, Germany.
“I pretty much paint all the time depending on my mood and if I see something that inspires me,” she said. “I use various me- dia but not oil because of my concern for the environment. My favorite medium is to mix watercolor acrylics and different chalk paint. I pretty much use anything with water.”
Her love of cats goes back to her father, who was a cat person, and further fueled by the ravages of WWII. “I grew up with cats. We found and rescued so many lost and motherless kittens and cats after the war was over,” Reeves recalls. “We had no choice but to save them – everyone who could tried to save them – especially the injured ones just like people do now in Ukraine and Gaza.”
She and a friend feed homeless cats every evening; rain, cold, hot, miserable weather or not. “Some good people help us with food and money to have them spayed and neutered, and if they
are not too feral find good homes for them,” she says. “The ferals become community cats. People consistently will abandon or purposely throw them out and not having them spayed or neutered, particularly females when they get pregnant, so we try to capture them – not trap them – and have them fixed with the help of Fixing the Coast.”
Reeves promised her father before he died that wherever she went or lived in the world she would take care of homeless cats. She appreciates the many friends who help the cause. If they
find a lost dog, they contact animal control. “Never ignore a homeless animal, please,” she says.
This artist and animal rescuer has also done other things. She was once in the military, is a trained minor pastry chef and ran a 16-room bed and breakfast in Biloxi for a few years until Hurri- cane Katrina changed that.
“All our lives changed again then and I had to do something else,” she recalls. “I began to do specialty painting such as faux finishes in beautiful homes; that's another story in itself. Now at 82, I live a more quiet life, paint, and take care of the homeless and throw-away cats with some financial help from some good people.”
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