Karen Korell

Karen Korell (wearing her Louise Bourgeois shirt) 
1/14/44 - 8/30/10

Karen was a good friend of mine, but now Karen is gone, gone, gone. Yeah, life continues for the rest of us, but there are moments when I find the finality of Karen's death so difficult to fathom, I send an e-mail off to her - my beloved twodot - in hopes that somewhere "on the other side," the words "You've got mail" reach her "forever ear."

It amuses me to think of her interrupting some celestial chore - let's say the laundry (she's down to her last man-cut gossamer raiment, after all - still all the fashion in the firmament) - as she pauses to decode my pixels and texts to find as much mortal angst and not-so-divine comedy as I can squeeze into 37 kilobytes.

Meanwhile, back at the planet, I track her web-foot-print to find traces of her life or her work - some way to log on or link in to her consciousness. But, alas, her web-site is now parked somewhere in Japan and although the search engines offer me several Karen Korells, most of them are imposters; four of them live in Montana alone and if ever there was an unKaren-like state, it would be the home of the Unabomber!

Undaunted, I decide I will hack even into the dark net if I have to...past the terrorists, the neo-Nazi's, the child pornographers and the hate groups (Karen did several series of works including Dead French Children, Dead Russians and Unabomber). There I will search for the portal, the key, the elusive worm-hole that will teleport me through cyberspace or outerspace or afterspace: wherever Karen continues to be.

I put forth this effort because I find the idea of oblivion to be so much more heinous than death itself. I suspect Karen felt the same way. Indeed, better to have one's body - one's eyeballs, elbows, entrails and all... swept up into a funnel shaped cloud than to have one's excruciatingly catalogued slides, journals, sketchbooks - one's life's work - scatter in the very same wind.

Thus, this is my tribute to Karen Korell and, as a matter of fact, my own little protest against oblivion itself. Because - dammit - if death is the hitman, oblivion is the thieving, memory-sucking CEO of the netherworld. Is there a soul out there who isn't positively sick over its monopoly over the place? So, you might say this blog - as feeble a memorial as you might ever encounter - is simply my way to "Occupy the Void." I can hear Karen's laughter filling the abyss already; those who know her can anticipate boiled eggs and Panna to follow! (Now Karen's dietary preferences -displayed in LED as she had done - was divine comedy!)

The incidentals of Karen's life - her place of residence, how she made a living, how much money she (or anybody else) made - were never important to her, so I will not dwell on them here. Let it suffice to note that Karen lived the second half of her life very quietly in a small town where most people knew little more about her than the fact that she owned and operated 88 Printers. In the last few years of her life, a few more came to know her as an activist and creator of Splashdown Blogspot. http://splashdownpa.blogspot.com/.

Karen with friends in front of her print shop.

But Karen identified, first and foremost, as an artist, and although she reveled in the natural beauty of the rivers, lakes and mountains that surrounded her, she never painted a barn or a landscape. Rather, Karen's concerns - and her art - were of the mind.

For that reason, Karen never exhibited in her community (which also happens to be my hometown). She simply wasn't interested in showing her work where it would fail to be understood or appreciated. However, before moving to rural America, she had exhibited extensively in New York City (her hometown), nationally, and abroad.

Her web-page can no longer be accessed (it truly is parked in Japan), but she once wrote about her own work...

Concerns motivating my work question the nature and meaning of art and life itself, as concepts meet reality and meaning looks for language. While I have always worked as a painter, in 2 and 3 dimensions, during the early 1970's I was also an early pioneer in the public art arena. To realize an art-for-all philosophy dear to my heart, I distributed several series of printed works, "Accumulations", both as mailings, and directly, with the help of a team of artists, at specific locations in New York City. My goal was to generate unfiltered responses to art through unexpected encounters. (see Village Voice article, 10.1.70; NY Post interview, 12.14.71)

In 1971 I was honored to have been invited by Buckminster Fuller to be one of 5 artist participants in his “World Game Seminar” (NYC), an effort to prioritize and explore ways to sustainably meet humanity's needs globally. During the 70's and 80's I was also invited to contribute work to various exhibitions, both in the U.S. and abroad, notably: Los Angeles Institute of Contemporary Art, Women’s Graphic Center, LA; Franklin Furnace Archives, NYC; Wabash Transit Gallery, Chicago; Image Bank, Vancouver; National Research Library, Ottawa; Metronom, Barcelona; in New Delhi and Australia; and to an exhibition of the letters of Ray Johnson (with whom I maintained an active art correspondence) at the North Carolina Museum of Art.

The Allotted Time, mixed media

The Diabetic Brain, illustration for Penn State University

The bulk of Karen's artwork is now in the possession of her friend who is planning on curating a retrospective of Karen's work in the not-so-distant future. While I can share only a few photographs of a few pieces of her work, we will all have to wait for the exhibition to be able to see the rest. Any memorial to Karen is pathetically incomplete without her artwork. Her artwork is the real protest against oblivion.

Art is what she loved, but the exceptional human being that was Karen Korell transcended even her art. She embraced life with a passion, intensity and humor that could not be extinguished even when confronted with the terminal illness with which she lived for a half dozen years. To be in Karen's presence - even when she faced death - was simply magical.

Karen wearing her "healing jacket," several friends collaboratively created for her.
Her friend, Judy, stitched the pieces together.

The other day I visited Karen's loft (about to be sold) to pick up a book I had loaned her, as well as a watercolor she and I had collaborated on together (which was better than I had remembered).

I entered the building hesitatingly, expecting to be overwhelmed with sadness over her absence. It was spooky to see that most of her furniture and personal accoutrements (by turns exotic and whimsical - a veritable walk-in cabinet of curiosities) were gone. Especially conspicuous in its absence was her artwork.

In her studio, however, a few of her personal journals and sketchbooks remained.

I held my breath as I turned the pages which seemed to me an almost sacred act, this post-mortem peek into another person's soul. The journals, full of notes and drawings, revealed the playful and inventive imagination of their ingenious maker. I could hear, again, Karen's ethereal laughter as I ingested her drawings, so skillfully and vividly executed, knowing they were intended for posterity.

On a couple of occasions, I had an opportunity to videotape Karen and I am so glad I did. I videotaped her with my older camera and edited it using iphoto. I plan to edit further with Premiere Pro to heighten the resolution and to make it better. The best part of it, though, is Karen whose light shines through even with poor resolution. On each occasion when I videotaped her, however, the documentation became another kind of collaboration with Karen. How fortunate I have been to know her!

This blog is a work in progress and I welcome any of Karen's friends to post memories they have of her. Include photos of her, her artwork or even videos (Blogger has made it much easier to upload videos!). Please feel free to comment or to contact me!