It is not often you come across something original, of its own style and unique. On first glance Karen's collages appear as paintings, often abstract. After a few moments, you begin to see boats, shorelines or harbours; swathes of colour interspersed with subtle textures and elements of typography. However, it is only on closer inspection that you realise these are not paintings, but instead they are masterful and pleasing collages, and certainly not like anything else you might have seen before.
Karen uses collage as other artists might use brushes: moving and shaping layers of papers and tissues, as well as other found papers, to create confident compositions of distressed surfaces, dynamic shapes and textures. Close your eyes and run your fingers lightly across the canvas and you will feel the layers representing peeling paint and the blistered, rusting surfaces belonging to ancient harbours, boats and ships. So evocative are they that you begin to think you can even smell the sea and hear the water lapping along the hulls of the boats.
Exhibitions and Galleries
Society of Women Artists
RWA Bristol
The Other Art Fair
Edinburgh Art Fair
Little Buckland Gallery, Cotswolds
Thomas Henry Gallery, Newlyn
Whitehouse Gallery Kirkudbright
Morningside Gallery, Edinburgh
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