Amanda Dunbar (born 1982) is a Texas-based artist who gained notoriety at an early age for her oil painting skills. Amanda Dunbar began painting in an after school art class at the age of 13. Her spontaneous and advanced works acquired significant interest immediately. Dunbar is currently listed as a prodigy of the visual arts in the current textbooks for advanced university education entitled Child Psychology published by John Wiley & Sons Canada, Ltd. Early life and education Amanda Dunbar was born in Thunder Bay, Ontario, Canada. She moved to Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, at the age of 4 and attended Orleans Wood Elementary School. Dunbar moved with her family to Allen, Texas. where she attended Ford Middle School and graduated from Allen High School in 2000. At the end of the eighth grade she signed up for an after-school art class where the instructor asked the class to paint something - anything - so that he could gauge their skill level. Dunbar picked up a brush and created Mother's Touch, a portrait in the French impressionist style of a woman in a blue dress drying her small daughter after her bath. The impressed instructor quickly notified Dunbar's parents of her unusual skill. When she was young she liked many things such as cooking, drawing, acting, singing, etc. She never knew what she wanted to as she grew up. She thought she could be a nurse like her mother. But, she never thought that her career would be becoming an artist. Dunbar graduated from Southern Methodist University in Dallas with a BFA in 2004. She graduated cum laude with departmental distinction. Dunbar was named State Artist of Texas in 2005. She went on to study abroad in France, Italy and Spain. She acquired a post baccalaureate certification at the Pont Aven School of Contemporary Art in 2006. In 2006 she also became the youngest honoree on record and is the only painter to date to be inducted into the Texas Women's Hall of Fame. She was 23 at the time and honored in the arts category. In 2009 Dunbar was awarded a Distinguished Alumni Award from Southern Methodist University for Emerging Leadership. Earlier in the year she was awarded the 2009 Americanism Medal by the Daughters of the American Revolution. Career Dunbar began painting at the age of 13 and had a solo exhibition in Dallas, Texas, at the age of