Karen Lederer

Region: Northeast

Website: http://www.karenlederer.com

City / State: Brooklyn, NY

I operate at the intersection of art and design. At RISD, I learned machine knitting and surface design, and since then have been constructing objects and patterns for my art. I work on paintings and prints concurrently. Painting is a careful process of calculated moves, whereas monoprinting is fast and intuitive. Forms and colors discovered through printing pollinate the paintings and vice versa. My paintings explore dimensional still lifes and my prints focus on flat patterns. Moving between the two mediums, I build and present an intuitive, irrational voice.

My art offers a proposal for a way of living. Rejecting the model of stark, modernist space, it revels in excess. It acknowledges a deep human need to adorn our surroundings. We find ourselves in our possessions. Through the juxtaposition of patterns and objects, we construct a malleable self-portrait. As our identity shifts, we find new motifs, like hieroglyphs, to tell our story.