Karen Thorson in attendance at Paradise art show
<p>Karen Thorson displays one of her art clusters, a landscape painting paired with a complimentary fused glass piece.</p>
PLAINS – When Karen Thorson steps into her studio, her face lights up. It’s a place all her own where she can create to her heart’s content. The small, tidy area is filled with paintings, glass and clay sculptures – three different venues of art Thorson produces.
Thorson considers herself a landscape visual artist and she gets her inspiration from the beauty found within Montana.
She spends much of her time creating art clusters, two or three different art pieces from the different mediums that compliment each other in one way or another. The groups address the same subject matter.
Thorson once taught high school art and she credits her variety of creating methods to her teaching days.
“The thing about having more than one medium that I enjoy, goes back to those teaching days,” Thorson said.
Thorson loves all three mediums just as much as the other. With no favorite in mind, she feeds off her inspiration and puts it into whatever medium she thinks will work best. Her favorite part is involving herself entirely in her work.
“I enjoy involving all my senses. I enjoy the smell of paint. I enjoy the act of painting. With glass, I enjoy the color. There are just some amazing colors in glass and I enjoy the sound of getting that cut just right. With clay, I love the touch of it, and I leave fingerprints and that sort of thing in my work,” Thorson said. “I enjoy them all for very different reasons.”
She also enjoys the feedback she receives from others who see her creations.
Thorson is excited to display her works of art at the Artists in Paradise exhibit and is most excited to spend some time with the artists in the Sanders County Arts Council.
“The truth of the matter is I’m excited for the group to get together for four days and enjoy each other and inspire each other. That’s really what our group is all about,” Thorson said.
Once the exhibit is over, Thorson will head out on another adventure, this one much bigger than the exhibit. She has been chosen as one of the few artists who get to participate in the Artist-Wilderness Connection, sponsored by the Bob Marshall Wilderness Foundation, the Flathead National Forest, Hockaday Museum of Art in Kalispell and the Swan Valley Ecosystem Center.
Thorson will trek out into the woods for 14 days, packing into a remote Forest Service cabin. From there she will create art to share with those who are unable to make it into the wilderness.
“The goal is to share what the wilderness experience is like for people that for whatever reason aren’t able to get there,” Thorson said.
She plans to do an art cluster of a glass piece, a clay piece and a painting for the four elements of the wilderness: earth, sky, wind and water. Although the glass and clay pieces have to be created at home due to the need of a kiln, Thorson will be painting her 30x40 paintings in the challenging environment.
The experience will be a test of her strength as well as her skill, something she greatly looks forward to.
“I’m excited to go. It’s bare bones existence so part of the challenge is to find the four landscapes and at least capture them in paint,” Thorson said.