The California Society of Printmakers and the New Museum Los Gatos are pleased to present Thinking Outside the Frame, a juried printmaking exhibition featuring works that fall outside the realm of traditional printmaking, exploring scale, installation, book arts, and innovative processes. Juried by Cathy Kimball, Executive Director of the San Jose ICA.

Exhibit opens Friday May 18 and continues through September 30. Please join me & my fellow juried California Society of Printmakers for the reception on Thursday, May 17th from 6-8 pm where we will be available to discuss these exciting pieces & the theme of format + process experimentation within printmaking.

Marks can be descriptive, expressive, conceptual, or symbolic, and appear across all genres of artwork from abstract to representational. A mark can be made with a splash or drip of paint, or a thread through space. I am thrilled to be included in Make Your Mark, the summer national exhibition curated by juror Jen Tough, owner of the Jen Tough Gallery in Benicia. 

Exhibit opens June 16 and continues through July 29. Please join us at the opening reception on Saturday, June 16th from 5-7 pm. I will be present to talk about this newest work, and the inspirations behind its process and concept.

This spring I had the great fortune to begin an ambitious lithography project. While my Kala residency comes to a close at the end of May, there is still so much more I plan to continue in the future. With a little luck and a lot of wiggling, I hope to return in the late fall to conclude a suite of prints with a few larger stand alone pieces. 

With the dedicated time and access to Kala's vast facilities, I was able to dust off my press skills and test out some newer concepts & image making processes. I certainly had a few stumbling points making me rethink, re-strategize, and face the truth of what I truly wanted to accomplish with traditional printmaking. After weeks of testing, printing, and drawing I've arrived at the exact right-for-me place, and have been able to resolve a collection of wash drawn images & a few multi-color editions. I am extremely excited to have worked everything out. Now jumping onto the press will be a smoother transition going forward. A dream after stopping for so long with multiple pregnancies and young   children these past years.  An extra bonus was working out a way to continue printing in my home studio for the months in between!  I feel like I won big, really big!

For anyone interested, the deadline to apply for Kala's Artist Parent Award is May 25th.  I encourage all you parent artists who have an idea for a print project to apply! It is liberating to clear the time and have the equipment & funding to play with your ideas without worrying about a return on your investment every step of the way.

Thank You Kala Art Institute!

Here's to a productive Spring and an inspiring Summer!

Wishing you the warmest of days to come,

        Karen