Kate Vrijmoet is an American artist who lives and works in
Seattle
Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest regio ...
.
Biography
Kate Vrijmoet began formal art studies at
Moore College of Art
Moore College of Art & Design is a private art school in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Its undergraduate programs are available only for female students, but its other educational programs, including graduate programs, are co-educational.
Hist ...
, Philadelphia, taking weekend classes while attending high school (1982–1983). She went on to study at the
School of Visual and Performing Arts at
Syracuse University
Syracuse University (informally 'Cuse or SU) is a Private university, private research university in Syracuse, New York. Established in 1870 with roots in the Methodist Episcopal Church, the university has been nonsectarian since 1920. Locate ...
, and was invited to teach there in 1994, earning her
MFA in 1997. She studied
painting
Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called the "matrix" or "support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush, but other implements, such as knives, sponges, and ...
with Evelina Brozgul at the
School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
The School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts University (Museum School, SMFA at Tufts, or SMFA; formerly the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston) is the art school of Tufts University, a private research university in Boston, Massachusett ...
in 2004 and with Richard Ryan at
Boston University
Boston University (BU) is a private research university in Boston, Massachusetts. The university is nonsectarian, but has a historical affiliation with the United Methodist Church. It was founded in 1839 by Methodists with its original campu ...
from 2005 to 2006. After recognition in
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
for her project, ''50 Paintings in 50 Days'',
[Susan Macura (November 2008) "50 Paintings in 50 Days" ''Harlem Valley Times''] her work was curated into a group show receiving press in the ''
New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
''
and the ''
New York Journal News''.
In 2010 she had her first solo exhibition at the Center on Contemporary Art CoCA
[CoCA (February 2010)]
''Kate Vrijmoet: Essential Gestures''
/ref> in Seattle, and was reviewed in the ''Seattle Times
''The Seattle Times'' is a daily newspaper serving Seattle, Washington, United States. It was founded in 1891 and has been owned by the Blethen family since 1896. ''The Seattle Times'' has the largest circulation of any newspaper in Washington st ...
''.[Michael Upchurch (February 18, 2010)]
''Review: Abstract, figurative collide in Vrijmoet paintings''
''Seattle Times'' Her painting, ''Shotgun Accident'' won third place in the 2010 Ecuador Biennale of Painting, a decision that has recently caused controversy according to the Ecuador newspaper ''El Telégrafo'', which reported that many considered Vrijmoet the rightful first-place winner. Vrijmoet was one of 16 American artists whose work was included in the 5th Beijing International Art Biennale The Beijing International Art Biennale (BIAB) is a Chinese bienniale for international contemporary art, hosted in Beijing. It has taken place since 2003, with a schedule that was pushed back one year in 2008 to coincide with the Beijing Olympics ...
. Her painting, "Naked Snow Blower", a part of Vrijmoet's ''Accident's'' series, was exhibited in the National Museum of China
The National Museum of China () flanks the eastern side of Tiananmen Square in Beijing, China. The museum's mission is to educate about the arts and history of China. It is directed by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism of the People's Republic ...
beginning September 28, 2012. In 2014 she curated the Social Practice
Social practice is a theory within psychology that seeks to determine the link between practice and context within social situations. Emphasized as a commitment to change, social practice occurs in two forms: activity and inquiry. Most often a ...
Art exhibit, "The Incredible Intensity of Just Being Human," in Seattle City Hall, a traveling exhibit aimed at ending the stigma and silence surrounding mental illness.
File:Shotgun_Accident_KV.png, ''Shotgun Accident'', Latex on Canvas, 63" x 50", 2009
File:Ribs_of_Disaster_KV.png, ''Ribs of disaster curving their assertion among the tentative haunters'', Oil on Canvas, 7’ x 8’ 2008
Work
Through paintings, installations and social art, Vrijmoet focuses on issues of consciousness, scale, accessibility and ownership. A student of anatomy since childhood, Vrijmoet has for three decades included life drawing in her daily practice. She is currently completing her ''Accident'' series and her ''Non-ordinary Reality'' series. In August, 2010, the Center on Contemporary Art in Seattle published a 42-page catalog for her solo show, ''Kate Vrijmoet: Essential Gestures''.[CoCA (2010)]
''Kate Vrijmoet: Essential Gestures''
In 2011 Vrijmoet's work was featured in a South Seattle Community College
South Seattle College (SSC, formerly South Seattle Community College) is a public community college in West Seattle, Washington. Founded in 1970, it is one of three colleges which make up the Seattle Colleges District. The Seattle Community Colleg ...
showing, and during a solo show at the LANN Museum in Guayaquil, Ecuador
, motto = Por Guayaquil Independiente en, For Independent Guayaquil
, image_map =
, map_caption =
, pushpin_map = Ecuador#South America
, pushpin_re ...
.
Her profile was featured in the inaugural issue of the ''Huffington Post
''HuffPost'' (formerly ''The Huffington Post'' until 2017 and sometimes abbreviated ''HuffPo'') is an American progressive news website, with localized and international editions. The site offers news, satire, blogs, and original content, and ...
'' Arts Section.[Ming Holden (June 18, 2010]
''What Does Ecuador Have to Do with Seattle?''
Huffington Post Kate discuses her work in detail in an interview published by the science and culture digest 3 Quarks Daily
''3 Quarks Daily'' is an online news aggregator and blog that curates commentary, essays, and multimedia from selected periodicals, newspapers, journals, and blogs. The focus is on literature, the arts, politics, current affairs, science, philos ...
.[Elatia Harris (September 13th, 2010]
'Kate Vrijmoet: A Non-ordinary Painting Trajectory'
/ref> In her exhibit book, The Incredible Intensity of Just Being Human 4 she writes, "Art connects us. It tells us we're human, we're like one another, we feel the same emotions. My mission as a human being, and my job as an artist, is to use art to create deep connections among us. Those deep connections already exist, but sometimes convention rewards us for ignoring them. I contend that the greater rewards come from exploring them.".
In 2011 Vrijmoet's installation piece ''"Mother May I…?"'' was exhibited at the Orange County Center on Contemporary Arts (OCCCA),in a show that was endorsed by Nicolas Bourriaud
Nicolas Bourriaud (born 1965) is a curator and art critic, who has curated a great number of exhibitions and biennials all over the world.
With Jérôme Sans, Bourriaud cofounded the Palais de Tokyo in Paris, where he served as codirector from 199 ...
, who coined the term relational aesthetics, or Relational art
Relational art or relational aesthetics is a mode or tendency in fine art practice originally observed and highlighted by French art critic Nicolas Bourriaud. Bourriaud defined the approach as "a set of artistic practices which take as their theor ...
. In 2012 this installation was featured in the largest artist-run, not for profit organization in Brooklyn, the Brooklyn Artists Waterfront Coalition's (BWAC) juried show. ''"Mother May I…?,"'' — an interactive audio installment designed to address our fundamental sense of belonging — was awarded "Best Installation" by Charlotta Kotik, curator of the Brooklyn Museum
The Brooklyn Museum is an art museum located in the New York City borough of Brooklyn. At , the museum is New York City's second largest and contains an art collection with around 1.5 million objects. Located near the Prospect Heights, Crown H ...
of Art. Vrijmoet's work has featured in New York City shows juried by curators of the Metropolitan Museum of Art
The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 1000 ...
(Anne Strauss), the Guggenheim (Nat Trotman), and Museum of Modern Art
The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues.
It plays a major role in developing and collecting modern art, and is often identified as one of ...
(Paulina Pobocha).
In 2013 she began curating a Social Practice Art exhibit aimed at ending the stigma and silence surrounding mental illness. The Incredible Intensity of Just Being Human has been exhibited at the Seattle Center
Seattle Center is an arts, educational, tourism and entertainment center in Seattle, Washington, United States. Spanning an area of 74 acres (30 ha), it was originally built for the 1962 World's Fair. Its landmark feature is the tall Space Needl ...
, and Highline College
Highline College is a public community college in Des Moines, Washington. Highline was founded in 1961 as the first community college in King County, Washington. The main campus covers . , there were approximately 17,000 students and 350,000 alu ...
. In 2014 she won prestigious grants through Artist Trust
Artist Trust is a not-for-profit organization dedicated to supporting Washington artists working in all creative disciplines. Artist Trust provides artists the time and resources necessary to prosper. Since 1987 it has invested over ten million dol ...
and Seattle Department of Neighborhoods to further fund this exhibit in Seattle City Hall
Seattle City Hall (also known as the Seattle Municipal Building) is the home of the offices of the mayor and city council of Seattle, Washington, located between 4th Avenue and 5th Avenue in the downtown area of the city. Most city departments h ...
where civic leaders Mayor Ed Murray, Randy Revelle
Randall Revelle (April 26, 1941- June 3, 2018) was the third King County Executive, having served from his election in November 1981 until January 1, 1986. He also served on the Seattle City Council from 1974 to 1981.
Revelle received some natio ...
, Brady Walkinshaw
Brady Piñero Walkinshaw (born March 26, 1986) is an American businessman and politician who served in the Washington State House of Representatives from 2013 to 2017. Walkinshaw represented the 43rd legislative district, which encompasses much ...
, and Tina Orwall
Tina Louise Orwall (born April 3, 1965) is an American politician serving as the Speaker pro tempore of the Washington House of Representatives since 2021, a position she previously held from 2017 to 2018. A member of the Democratic Party, she is ...
spoke at the opening reception about mental illness. Vrijmoet's project was supported by Seattle Office of Arts and Culture, and Allied Arts Foundation.
Also in 2013 she participated in SEAF with her social sculpture "Poor Impulse Control"- an example of relational art
Relational art or relational aesthetics is a mode or tendency in fine art practice originally observed and highlighted by French art critic Nicolas Bourriaud. Bourriaud defined the approach as "a set of artistic practices which take as their theor ...
, social sculpture, or ironic participation. In this form the artist exploits the role of the viewer as the art object. The primary role of social sculpture is not one of beauty, but of intervention through discomfort. The audience has an interdependent relationship with the work. Of this social sculpture Vrijmoet writes, "The collapse of the emotional and physical boundaries inherent to the human experience is a recurrent theme in my work. ..my work directly engages participants communally, even as it remains distinctly personal to each audience member. Although initiated by a single creator, audience participation is fundamental to making my work come to life."
In the catalog essay of her CoCA solo exhibit, "Essential Gestures", Elatia Harris writes of her work, "Any single image from the ''Accident'' series will freeze you where you stand. Motionlessly, you check yourself for parts and think, ''Oh, that's the thing, the thing that happened to me, even if no one sees it''. The Water paintings, on the other hand, will dislocate you – you are pulled, plunged and buoyed, seeing up and through and down." Maine writer and art critic, Dan Kany, writes Vrijmoet's work takes a "supremely anti-modernist stance – following the idea that Modernism
Modernism is both a philosophy, philosophical and arts movement that arose from broad transformations in Western world, Western society during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The movement reflected a desire for the creation of new fo ...
doesn't privilege the artist/author over the viewer." A show of her ''Accident'' Series Paintings was exhibited in 2013 at Columbia Basin College
Columbia Basin College (CBC) is a public community college in Pasco, Washington. It is accredited by the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities. The college offers English as a second language and General Educational Development (GED) ...
's Esvelt Gallery in Eastern Washington
Eastern Washington is the region of the U.S. state of Washington located east of the Cascade Range. It contains the city of Spokane (the second largest city in the state), the Tri-Cities, the Columbia River and the Grand Coulee Dam, the Hanfor ...
.
In 2014 she published an article The Broader Economic Impact of Donating Your Art, that went viral on social media outlets and was viewed more than 2 million times across the globe.[Kate Vrijmoet (March 2014)' Omphaloskepsis] This article continues to inspire dialog surrounding fundraising in the arts.
In 2015 Vrijmoet participated in The Richard Siken
Richard Siken (born February 15, 1967) is a North-American poet, painter, and filmmaker. He is the author of the collection '' Crush'' (Yale University Press, 2005), which won the Yale Series of Younger Poets Competition in 2004. His second book o ...
Project, in which 11 artists respond to The War of the Foxes, through Copper Canyon Press
Copper Canyon Press is an independent, non-profit small press, founded in 1972 specializing exclusively in the publication of poetry. It is located in Port Townsend, Washington.
Copper Canyon Press publishes new collections of poetry by both popu ...
.
References
External links
*
Center on Contemporary Art
LANN Museum
Columbia Basin College
Biennial Foundation
National Art Museum of China
Orange County Center on Contemporary Art
Seattle Office of Arts and Culture
The Incredible Intensity
{{DEFAULTSORT:Vrijmoet, Kate
1966 births
Living people
Artists from Philadelphia
Syracuse University alumni
American conceptual artists
Women conceptual artists
American women painters
Interactive art
People from Cheltenham, Pennsylvania
21st-century American women artists
American contemporary painters