Check out Karen Philippi’s Artwork

Today we’d like to introduce you to Karen Philippi.

Karen, we’d love to hear your story and how you got to where you are today both personally and as an artist.
Growing up in Wallingford CT, some of my earliest memories are of riding in the car on rainy days. I had a curious fascination with water droplets on the windows and the fluid lenses they created. Thinking back now, I believe it was from those tiny droplets that a path emerged for my creative pursuits. Before I began my studies, I lived for a few years in a sea cottage on Matunuck beach in Rhode Island. This was my first experience with the open ocean and I was in awe of its power and moods. I was drawn by the way the ocean could evoke many emotions without words. This is one of the themes I continue to explore in my work today. At the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, I studied two of my passions, photography, and sculpture. It was with photography that I could have a creative and practical way to earn a living after graduation.

After SAIC, I moved back to Rhode Island and began working with photographer Paul Clancy. He was an amazing mentor who greatly furthered my experience. He opened my world to the beauty and language of vintage lenses. Today, I have an extensive collection of rare and unusual lenses from around the world that I use to create my work. Paul and I traveled widely and worked for an array of clients including Audi, Blue Cross, Statoil, and Polaroid.

In addition to my personal fine art, I am busy with commercial work. I’m in and out of my studio shooting people, products, and places. An important part of that devoted to bringing out the best of every artist’s work. I also work regularly with the Harvard Art Museums to document special exhibitions. Like most New Englanders, I have a love-hate relationship with winter. This has been eased by an annual retreat to Uruguay. My biggest passion is to continue exploring and shooting coasts around the world.

We’d love to hear more about your art. What do you do you do and why and what do you hope others will take away from your work?
More than observing the sea, I feel it through my lens. Wading into my subject (sometimes ruining my cameras), I am lost in time, free somehow. In this space, I can be in touch with my past and present selves. My fascination with the water goes back as far as I can remember, but I began shooting waves over 25 years ago.

My seascapes are elemental portraits that capture an absolutely unique compression of time, the earth and oceans movement and my own in each image. The images live in contradiction with their motion and restfulness. They capture the power and placidity of the sea. I use blurring (shallow depth of field and long exposure), not so much to obscure as to optically paint. Some of my images are barely recognizable as waves. Sometimes a horizon is visible. Sometimes sand. Occasionally, a glowering sky is so low it is indistinguishable from the sea. But always, always the waves.

This very indistinctness defies definition and leaves the work open to broad interpretation. Foam, ripples, cresting waveforms emerge and become an emotive part of the photograph’s structure. I mainly present my seascapes as ready to hang work. They are printed archivally on a German etching paper and cold mounted onto wood panels with a palette knife waxed finish.

Artists face many challenges, but what do you feel is the most pressing among them?
I would say the financial challenges of being an artist are prevalent in the community. Education is expensive. Studios are expensive. Supplies are expensive. Artists who do not go into teaching are generally living without regular paychecks. If you find someone whose work you like, the best thing you can do to be of help to that artist is collect it.

Do you have any events or exhibitions coming up? Where would one go to see more of your work? How can people support you and your artwork?
Anyone interested can see my work in Massachusetts in person at Erdreich White Fine Art at 145 W Newton St., Boston, (617) 226-0644 or on the Vineyard at Sargent Gallery 832 State Rd, Aquinnah (508) 645-2776. Work can also be seen at Thayer Design Studio 383 Dorchester Ave, Boston (617)347-7160. I am also active on my Instagram and update my website fairly often.

Contact Info:

• Website: philippi-seascapes.com
• Phone: 4014515939
• Email: karen@karenphilippi.com
• Instagram: www.instagram.com/karen.philippi/

Image Credit:
Karen Philippi

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