Karen Clarkson

MATERIAL/TECHNIQUE:
Process: Changing the narrative is a way for art to influence today’s perceptions. Instead of Native women as victims, I am choosing to use my art to show them as strong and powerful representatives. With portrait titles such as Strength, Vision, Beauty and Confidence, I am painting today’s contemporary Native women as advocates, who are indispensable in their own story of survival. Technique: I use oil and/or acrylics in my process and love to push the boundaries - sometimes inserting QR codes into my art to make them interactive experiences. I like to use photos submitted by the models themselves or through a native photographer. I frame my own art, sometimes I even make my own frames. In diverse arts I am painting and beading various hides in traditional and non traditional ways to be used as wall hangings. The Choctaw Legends I have chosen have been interpreted by drawing upon meso-american era designs and symbols. They tell lessons used by the Choctaw to teach empathy, cooperation and perseverance. I sometimes use harvested and self preserved hides, as well as earth minerals.