Kim Polomka built his résumé in fine art in Adelaide, South Australia. Polomka started painting in his home city at age 13, learning the craft and establishing his name. Then he moved to Colorado Springs in 1999. "You can't take your reputation with you," Polomka said.

"That's where I'm trying to step in," said American Jennifer Malenky, his wife, arist rep and public relations liaison.

Polomka recently won the Colorado State Fair's juried art competition with "Discarded Orchid" in the professional painting division for the second straight year.

It isn't a solo exhibition in Bloomfield Galleries in Sydney, but the Knob Hill resident likes "the honesty of the state fair. It's pure," he said.

Springs residents might recognize Polomka's work from the Mozart@250 Celebration mural on the InSight Optical building on Pikes Peak Avenue.

The mural was commissioned for Colorado Springs Sisters Cities in conjunction with Nuevo Casas Grandes, Mexico, and the Mozart@250 Celebration.

He also painted the canvas mural on the north side of the World Savings Building at Pikes Peak and Tejon Street.

Three cows for the Cow Parade in downtown Denver also were painted by Polomka.

But at the state fair, "most people go to see the cows - not the painted cows," he said.

Polomka said he doesn't mind the lack of attention - it's part of Australian culture not to distinguish oneself too much. Polomka, member of the Arts Commission of the Pikes Peak Region, mentioned the "tall poppy syndrome" - if an Australian sticks out or rises too high, his fellow countrymen will resent him and "cut" him down. "They just like everyone to be equal," Polomka said. "They're ruthless there," Malenky added. But since gaining permanent residence in the United States, Polomka is starting to appreciate the "huge ambition" of Americans. In Australia, he thought only of working as an artist and being creative - not about marketing as that might compromise his work.

In the States, "you do prints, you do posters, you do calendars," he said.

"It's so commercial," Malenky added.

Working out of his 200-square-foot studio downtown, Polomka said he can't pinpoint his inspiration.

"That's a good question," he said. "I have a great affinity with nature and stuff, and I make it up, like these things," pointing to seashell-pebblelike objects in one of his pieces. "Where I've seen them, I wouldn't know, but I know I've seen it somewhere."

Working primarily in acrylics but also in watercolors, jewelry - he still wears a silver pin he crafted - and murals, Polomka's work often is called superrealism, and he paints several of his objects from an above perspective.

He said some of his inspiration might come from Malenky, whom he met while she was vacationing in Australia in 1998.

A finished piece in his studio features bone-looking objects, a heart, a set of teeth and darkness. Across the room, his current pieces reveal flowers, green leaves and bright blues, greens, oranges and pinks.

"I guess I was yearning for her," he said. She rolled her eyes.

His studio contains six current projects - two on wooden easels and others leaning against walls.

"It becomes laborious, so I like to have as many as possible," Polomka said. "I could never work on just one piece."

ONLINE

Kim Polomka http://www.kimpolomka.com.