Karen David is a London-based artist, writer, curator and lecturer, who graduated with an MA in Fine Art at Wimbledon College of Arts in 2012.
Her multi-disciplinary practice examines themes and notions of mysticism with direct reference to consumerism and the domestic.
Karen David
Karen David is a London-based artist, writer, curator and lecturer, who graduated with an MA in Fine Art at Wimbledon College of Arts in 2012.
In 2014, she undertook a research trip to Marfa, Texas and Roswell, New Mexico. In 2015, she was Artist in Residence at Islington Mill, Manchester, and in 2016 won the Artist in Residence award on the BA Painting course at Wimbledon College of Arts.
David also runs Cork Lined Rooms; an artist interview and studio project based on the Proust Questionnaire.
Between 2016-18 Karen curated nine exhibitions at Perimeter Space in Griffin Gallery, encouraging intermedia, cross-disciplinary and experimental practices exhibiting over 80 artists, including Fabian Peake, Anne-Marie Creamer, Jessica Voorsanger and Sarah Baker.
In 2018, David began a PhD in Fine Art at University of Worcester with a studio focus on mythmaking, fictional narrative, communes and para-anthropology.
Karen David’s multi-disciplinary practice examines themes and notions of mysticism with direct reference to consumerism and the domestic. Through the use of materials, mediums and subcultures such as tie-dye, crystals, dreamcatchers and The X-Files, which she employs as aesthetic-shorthand for New Age and paranormal ideas, her work hovers between cynicism and sincerity, creating a space for experiment, magic, mythmaking and new meanings.
Her research has taken her to the southwest American desert to explore its landscape and mythologies and to inform an ongoing project of a fictional artists’ commune where residents investigate links between post-painterly abstraction, new age memorabilia and new possibilities in gardening.
Solo exhibitions include: Crystal Visions, CIMCOT, Pure Reason Tint of Violet, VITRINE, Santa Fe, Art Lacuna, and Searching for the Viable Essence, Jacob’s Island Gallery, London.
Group shows include: Liquid Crystal Display, Site Gallery, Sheffield, The Waiting Room, Wimbledon Space, London, JGM Summer Show, JGM Gallery, London, Godley VC House, Griffin Gallery, London, In The Future, Collyer Bristow Gallery, London, Without Shores, ASC Gallery, London Art Fair with White Conduit Projects, Anti-Social Realism, Charlie Smith Gallery, A Union of Voices, Horatio Jr, Gallery and Tomb, Shrine, Survey–Marker, Enclave Projects, Expanded Painting: Mock-a-Modern, Oval Gallery and WunderKammer, The Nunnery, London.
Email: k.david@londonmet.ac.uk