Kari Woo

 

The guiding principle in all the work that I do is to create meaning. As an artist this is my job. Whether it is personal expression through my mixed media works, community engagement through events or public art projects, product design and branding, or custom design for jewellery patrons – I want my work to be meaningful, impactful, and to make a difference. 

 

The common thread that ties all these sectors of my practice together is that of storytelling. In my mixed media assemblages I tell the story of my family’s migration, which I believe speaks to a wider and distinctly Canadian experience. As a community and art event organizer I am interested in finding a stage for other artist’s stories and bringing an audience to them. These events endeavor to make fine craft, art and design more accessible to the public by bringing it outside the gallery or boutique walls and educating viewers about the value of the work; the story of the maker. In a recent public art commission community members were invited to bring their own stories forward, which then became the content for the artworks. Custom jewellery design draws heavily upon personal stories and sentiment, which then become embodied in the finished piece. Finally, my product design for jewellery translates and distills my personal experience and observations of the world into form and object. 

 

Drawing influence from the likes of industrial and interior design, architecture, mixed media artist Joseph Cornell, sculptors Alexander Calder and Henry Moore, and inter-disciplinary artist, Joane Cardinal-Schubert, my aim is always to find new intersections of materials and ideas. In whatever capacity I am working I’m hopeful my work is a distinct and potent interpretation of what beauty there is to be found in the world.