Stars

5 x 4 x 4 cm

delica 11 beads, fireline, ready made hoops

Karen continues to make one a kind pieces based on the distillation of nature, light and colour. All of the designs begin in a sketchbook and tend to push the wearer's boundaries. She adheres to correct techniques and good quality supplies to produce jewellery that will last a lifetime. Recently she has become interested Geometric Beadwork and the many possibilities it offers as a structure for the artist. The journey to merge painting and drawing with the media of the glass seed bead holds an endless fascination for Karen.

Karen Hunter was born in 1959 and received her basic education in the Okanagan. In 1980 she received a Diploma of Fine Arts from Okanagan College in Kelowna, now UBCO. She finished her BFA ,with an emphasis on painting, at the Univ. of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon in 1983. Upon her return to BC, Karen set out to create and exhibit her large expressive canvases. She spent the next 20 years doing just that in BC and Saskatchewan. In the early 2000's she was ready for a more personal and tactile product. Her interest in beading was revived from many childhood days spent with a very craft oriented grandmother. Her fascination with beads merged her painting subjects of nature, light and colour into a new portable, and personal art product: Tubular Peyote Stitch beadwork. Karen continues to live in the South Okanagan where her time is spent gardening and making jewellery.