About the Artist

This page contains exhibition information, a bio and artist statement. To see articles written about and by Karin, see the Press section.

Open a complete resume in a new tab.


 

Recent Solo and Feature Exhibitions

(Bold colored text indicate links to photos for select exhibits.)

“Traditions and Process” Bainbridge Arts and Crafts, Bainbridge Island, WA, September 2022

“Matter of Time” Walker Fine Art, Denver, CO Featured Artist, Nov. 2021 – Jan. 2022

“The Space Between” Walker Fine Art, Denver, CO Featured Artist, Fall 2018

“HUMAN|NATURE” Walker Fine Art, Denver, CO, Featured Artist, summer 2017

“Painting with Pixels” Peninsula School of Art, Door County, WI, Featured Artist, 2017

“Tectonic SHIFT • Dynamics of Change” in Denver in 2016 can be viewed here.

Altering Natural Perceptions Featured Artist, Walker Fine Art, Denver, May-July 2016

“Shadows and Reflections” Solo exhibit, Bainbridge Arts and Crafts Gallery, Bainbridge, WA January 2015

“Natural Interludes” Featured Artist, Walker Fine Art, Denver, January-February 2014

“Natural Interludes” Solo exhibit, Patricia Cameron Gallery, Seattle, WA June-Aug. 2013

Featured Artist, Walker Fine Art, Denver, CO. Feb.-April 2012

“Open Space” Solo Exhibit, Patricia Cameron Gallery, Seattle March-April 2011

Featured Artist, Marshall LeKae Gallery, Scottsdale, AZ Nov. 2011

Featured Artist, “Confluence” Pearson Lakes Art Center, Okoboji, IA, July-Nov. 2010

“Environmental Studies” Bainbridge Arts and Crafts Gallery, Bainbridge, WA Sept. 2008

“Essential Elements” Walker Fine Art, Denver, CO July 2007

“PAINT+pixels” Orange County Center for Contemporary Art, Santa Ana, CA March 2007

Featured Artist, “Explorations” Edmonds Community College, Oct.-Dec. 2007


Selected Recent Group and Juried Exhibitions

“Cultivating Collections: Glass” Bardo Arts Center, Western Carolina University, May-July 2022

“Art of the Garden” Schack Art Center, Everett, WA June-August 2022

“Seattle Deconstructed Art Fair” Patricia Cameron Fine Art, August 2021

“Sleight of Hand: Imagination and Illusion” Lynn Hanson Gallery, Seattle, WA May 2019

“Art of the Garden” Schack Art Center, Everett, WA. Juried. June-Aug. 2019

“Creativity Persists” Center on Contermpory Art, Seattle, WA. May 2018

“Modern Touch 2” invitational, Lynn Hanson Gallery, Seattle, WA. February 2018

“Modern Touch” invitational, BallardWorks, Seattle, WA. September 2017

Tectonic SHIFT” McNichols Building, Denver Civic Center, juried installation, 2017

“Pressing On” Seattle Print Arts Exhibition, Schack Art Center, Everett, WA, November-December 2016

“35 Live” Center on Contemporary Art, Seattle (juried) March 2016

“Grid Show” Museo Gallery, Langley, Washington, (group invitational) May 2015

“Explorations” BallardWorks, Seattle July 2015

“Natural Forms” Shoreline Community College Gallery, by special invitation Feb. 2015

“Current: Bridging Post Digital Technologies” Southern Graphics Council invitaional exhibition at the San Francisco Academy of Art, March 2014

“Off the Grid” Columbia City Gallery, Seattle WA, March 2014 (group invitational)

“CoCA Collision: Past, Present, & Future” Center on Contermpory Art, Seattle, WA. September 2013

“Kenmore Art Show” Bastyr University, Kenmore, WA, June 2013

“New Media: Digital Art” Curator and invited artist, Bainbridge Arts and Crafts, Bainbridge, WA. April, 2013

“Grid on Madison” Baas Gallery, Seattle, WA. March. 2013

“Affordable Art Fair Seattle 2012”  Exhibition Hall, Seattle Center, November 2012

“Autumn Review” Patricia Cameron Gallery, Seattle, WA November, 2012

“GRID @ BallardWorks” BallardWorks, Seattle, WA September, 2012

“Currents: Seattle Print Arts 2012” University of Washington’s Jacob Lawrence Gallery. August, 2012

“Portals” Art Museum Complex, Duxbury, MA May 2011 (3 person)

“Summer Thoughts” Patricia Cameron Gallery, Seattle, WA, August 2010 (group invitational)

“The Woods” Bainbridge Arts and Crafts Gallery, Bainbridge, WA , May 2010 (group invitational)

“Pleasures of the Garden: Visualizing the Song of Songs” curated by Alice Dubiel. St. James Cathedral Chapel, Seattle, WA, May 2010

“Seattle Print Arts Salon Exhibition” Patricia Cameron Gallery, Seattle, WA February 2010 (group invitational)

(See sidebar for link to list continuation.)


Bio

Karin Schminke received her MFA from the University of Iowa and has been a professor of art at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, California State University Northridge, and the Laguna College of Art & Design. Since 1995, she has worked full time as a fine artist.

Schminke’s art has been shown extensively both nationally and internationally for over 25 years. Commissions and collections of her art appear in dozens of corporate and public spaces across the U.S. A few examples include the Smithsonian American Art Museum in D.C., Electronic Arts in Vancouver, several Seattle libraries including the University of Washington Bothell campus and a number of office buildings and hospitals on both coasts. She has also created many private commissions and is included in numerous private collections.

As a leader in exploring the integration of digital technologies with traditional art materials, her processes have been written about in dozens of books and periodicals. She has given numerous workshops and presentations across the country. In 1997 she co-organized Digital Atelier: A Printmaking Studio for the 21st Century at the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington DC, and was an artist in residence there for three weeks. For her contributions to this project she and her co-organizers received a Smithsonian/Computerworld Technology in the Arts Award. In 2001, she was invited to demonstrate digital printmaking techniques with the Digital Atelier at the opening of the Brooklyn Museum of Art’s 27th Print National, Digital: Printmaking Now.

In addition to the Smithsonian, she has participated as artist-in-residence at sites as diverse as the Whiteley Center in the San Juan Islands in Washington State, Harvey Littleton Studios in North Carolina and Herman Miller Inc. in Michigan. She continues share her work and techniques through her Facebook page “Schminke Fine Art”. 

With Dorothy Simpson Krause and Bonny Pierce Lhotka of the Digital Atelier™, Karin co-authored Digital Art Studio: Techniques for Combining Inkjet Printing with Traditional Art Materials published by Watson-Guptill in 2004. She also has co-authored over a dozen journal articles on this subject.

Karin maintains a studio in Kenmore, a suburb of Seattle, Washington.


Artist Statement

Experiencing nature provides a visual meditation on pattern and form that nourishes the mind and spirit. It provides the opportunity for contemplation of a vast array of intricate forms and an even wider assortment of complex visual relationships. Exploring those forms and relationships is the foundation of my art. The focus of my work is the grandeur in the small, the extraordinary in the common. It delves into relationships of form and pattern rather than realism.

Direct inspiration for my art comes from a wide range of natural sources: vistas, patterns, textures, light and shadow, structure and process. These elements are explored using a variety of media ranging from traditional media such as drawing and painting through “modern” tools such as digital printing (pigment ink) and laser etching and/or cutting.

The visual impression of each work is affected by both viewer position and quality of direct and ambient light, due to the use of textured surfaces and reflective materials in the work. These impressions mirror the human experience of nature, meanwhile capturing mutable aspects of the natural world.

At a time when so much of one’s life is disconnected from nature, my desire is that the work will forge greater personal connections to the natural world.