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North Fork native makes her mark in the art world

A few weeks before opening day, Kate Moore toured the new home of the Atlanta Braves, SunTrust Park. A Southold native, Ms. Moore got a sneak peek thanks to her small role in the renovation of the 41,000-seat stadium, which officially opens Friday when the Braves play San Diego.

The corridors of the stadium feature 16 original watercolors depicting images from the team’s history. Another 20 prints hang in suites. The artwork was created by Richard Sullivan, who is represented by Ms. Moore’s art agency, Sullivan Moore, in which he was also an original co-founder.

“I’m just so proud that we worked so hard and actually saw it come to life,” said Ms. Moore, a 2010 Southold High School graduate who holds down a full-time advertising job in addition to her work as an artists’ agent.

The friends, who met in college, launched their enterprise in 2014. Mr. Sullivan enjoyed creating art and Ms. Moore liked the business side. She eventually took full control of the enterprise and became Mr. Sullivan’s agent.

“I don’t know where I would be without Kate,” he said.

The Kentucky-based artist said that because Ms. Moore focuses on selling his work, he no longer has to worry about the business end and can concentrate fully on his craft.

Mr. Sullivan played on the Braves’ minor league team for five years. Despite his connection to the team, however, he said he wouldn’t have been able to get as much work at the stadium — or received as good a price — had it not been for Ms. Moore.

“I don’t think anybody realizes how young she is and how much she’s done in a few years,” Mr. Sullivan added. “I’m so lucky that I met her. I’m excited for the future.”

Ms. Moore, who recently turned 25, now represents 17 artists of all ages, including some who live and work overseas. Most are illustrators, graphic designers or painters hoping to have their work published.

She also works full-time at the MullenLowe advertising agency in Boston, where she currently lives. When her day job ends, anywhere from 6:30 to 10:30 p.m., her work with Sullivan Moore begins. That majority of that work gets done on the weekends, she said.

It’s her passion for the work that keeps her so motivated, she said.

“It’s really nice to feel like I’m making an impact on an artist,” she said. “What’s most rewarding is just seeing emerging artists become successful in their industries.”

Seeing a client’s work appear in the pages of The New Yorker magazine represented an early victory for Ms. Moore, who has also placed pieces in publications like The Washington Post and Rolling Stone, for example.

“I’ll never forget the first time The New Yorker emailed me,” she said. “I still remember when I realized it was The New Yorker, I was jumping up and down screaming.”

Ms. Moore said she was actually shy about her love for art during high school and surprised many of her classmates when she decided to attend Savannah College of Art and Design. She was always interested in photography, but during college she realized that although it was a passion, it wasn’t something she wanted to pursue as a career.

She switched her major to fashion marketing and management, with a minor in fashion design. Near the end of her college career, she realized how much she enjoyed collaborating with art students to complete a task, inspiring her to gear her affinity for art toward marketing.

As graduation approached in 2014, she said, she watched as countless talented artists struggled to find freelance work.

“I didn’t know why they were having such a hard time finding work when they graduated from school because they were so incredible,” Ms. Moore recalled.

Those struggles inspired her to create her own agency to represent and market emerging artists.

Ms. Moore credits her family for giving her the confidence to start her own business. Her parents, Patricia and William Moore, own a Southold law firm and encouraged their daughter to create something on her own. They told her that starting this new chapter right after college was the best time to do it.

“It’s all very exciting as a parent,” Patricia Moore said. “We knew she was going to work very hard.”

Ms. Moore, who still has her daughter’s old photographs hanging on the walls in her home and office, said she could not be prouder and is very impressed to watch her daughter work. She said Kate was always interested in self-educating, reading a lot and even debating legal issues with her father.

She also attributes a lot of her daughter’s confidence and aspirations to the Southold school system, which she said showed students “there is no limit to what they can do.”

“We can’t wait to see what she’ll do,” she said.

Photo caption: Kate Moore and artist Richard Sullivan in front of Mr. Sullivan’s paintings at the Atlanta Braves’ SunTrust park. (Courtesy photo)

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