About

Kristina King creates site-responsive installations and work in handmade paper. Her work investigates place, process, community, turbulence, fragility, decay, and the ephemeral. She was awarded a residency at Vermont Studio Center (2020) and a Studio Workshop Residency at Women’s Studio Workshop (2019). She received the 2019 Individual Artist Award (Visual Arts - Works on Paper) from the Maryland State Arts Council. She received her BFA from Denison University in 2014. Her work has been reviewed in BmoreArt and The Washington Post. Her work has been exhibited at Pyramid Atlantic Art Center, Allegany Arts Council, Willow Street Gallery, Via Umbria Galleria (solo show), Takoma Park Community Center, among others.

StateMENT

My work explores the paradoxical nature of the strength and fragility of paper as a medium. I was drawn to papermaking as a way to combine my installation, sculpture, and drawing practices using one material. Hand papermaking is the process making sheets of paper by sifting beaten fibers (i.e. cotton, flax, abaca) suspended in water through a screen. Through the wet process, papermaking gives me the ability to manipulate the final form it takes as it dries. I'll harness the environments around me while I'm working outside such as letting the rain make impressions on the work as it dries. I've recently delved into casting forms made of plexiglass scraps discarded during the art framing process.