“A library is a place that rents out knowledge and entertainment,” says Kari Kristensen, who says she first knew she wanted to be an artist while working at the library at the University of Guelph in her native Ontario. “My experience there led to the desire to bring beauty into the world.”
After earning a degree in art history, she stumbled on two printmaking co-ops while vacationing on Granville Island in Vancouver. “[It] was the first time I saw that people could make a living doing what they love,” she says. “I couldn’t believe it. I signed up on the waitlist, sold my house, and moved to British Columbia within a couple of months.”
That was almost 10 years ago, and she’s been a fulltime artist ever since, specializing in linoleum printmaking out of her East Vancouver studio. “I love lino,” she explains. “The smell, the way the knife feels carving through it, the giant rolls sitting on the floor beside my desk, waiting.”
Kristensen contributed to Wolf-Gordon’s Curated wallcovering collection with prints Chasing Shadow and Moraine Lake
Kristensen’s works have been transformed into super-sized murals and other installations, including one for a COVID art initiative last summer called Murals of Hope, a joint initiative between Vancouver’s Downtown Business Improvement Association and the Vancouver Mural Festival, where she conceived of eight metal mountain peaks with bases made of mirrored plexiglass to reflect the sky as well as downtown Vancouver. “The most successful artists are the ones that take you somewhere or show you something you haven’t seen before,” she says. “My ideas come from tapping on a memory and adding my own feelings to it, using lines to take the viewer to the same place with me.”
Most recently, Kristensen contributed to Wolf-Gordon’s Curated collection of digitally printed wallcoverings. “At first, I was reluctant to have my work on things, but I realized that design is a living and breathing entity,” she explains. “It’s not like the product is simply something art is put on. Rather, it’s woven into the fabric. Neither would exist without the other.”
Kristensen recently worked with local Vancouver company Vanterra on a stand-up paddleboard, and next up is a 54-foot-long mural for this month’s Vancouver Mural Festival. “There’s a lot of art to be done,” she adds, “and only one lifetime to do it.”
This article originally appeared in HD’s August 2021 issue.
More from HD:
25 Dramatic Staircases Elevate Their Surroundings
Nature and Architecture Intersect at 48° Nord
22 Wallcoverings That Make a Statement
