Julie McNair grew up in Louisiana and Texas and studied sculpture at North Texas State University and the University of Wyoming. Julie taught ceramics and sculpture at Mississippi State University until 1983. In Houston, TX, she worked as the Director of the Art League of Houston.
She moved to Telluride, CO in 1985 and operated her own gallery until 2003. Julie has been involved with the Ah Haa School as staff, instructor and volunteer since 1991 and used to frame for Telluride Gallery. Her work has been represented by many galleries in the Southwest and in Texas.
Over the years Julie mined the rich history of doll-making (which dates back 25,000 years) to make fantastical clay images that, like their cultural antecedents, make an invisible life visible: namely hers. Julie’s doll-like forms are at once ironical and allegorical, personal and universal, but always, they are magically expressive and tinged with pathos and/or humor.