Kristine McKenna is an

American American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, pe ...

journalist,

critic A critic is a person who communicates an assessment and an opinion of various forms of creative works such as art, literature, music, cinema, theater, fashion, architecture, and food. Critics may also take as their subject social or governmen ...

and art curator best known for her interviews with artists, writers, thinkers, filmmakers and musicians. Many of these have been collected in ''Book of Changes'' (2001) and ''Talk to Her'' (2004). Among the people she has interviewed and written about most often over the years are Exene Cervenka, Leonard Cohen,

David Lynch David Keith Lynch (born January 20, 1946) is an American filmmaker, visual artist and actor. A recipient of an Academy Honorary Award in 2019, Lynch has received three Academy Award nominations for Best Director, and the César Award for Be ...

Captain Beefheart Don Van Vliet (; born Don Glen Vliet; January 15, 1941 – December 17, 2010) was an American singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and visual artist best known by the stage name Captain Beefheart. Conducting a rotating ensemble known as Th ...

Brian Eno Brian Peter George St John le Baptiste de la Salle Eno (; born Brian Peter George Eno, 15 May 1948) is a British musician, composer, record producer and visual artist best known for his contributions to ambient music and work in rock, pop an ...

and Dan Hicks.

Career

McKenna wrote for the '' Los Angeles Times'' from 1977 through 1998 and was one of the first mainstream journalists chronicling the early L.A. punk rock scene. She was Music Editor for influential avant-garde arts publication '' Wet'' and West Coast Editor of NME. Her profiles and criticism have appeared in '' Artforum'', '' The New York Times'', '' ARTnews'', ''Vanity Fair'', '' The Washington Post'', '' Rolling Stone'' and many other publications. She was awarded a National Endowment for the Arts Administration grant (1976) and a Critics Fellowship from the

National Gallery of Art The National Gallery of Art, and its attached Sculpture Garden, is a national art museum in Washington, D.C., United States, located on the National Mall, between 3rd and 9th Streets, at Constitution Avenue NW. Open to the public and free of char ...

(1991). She has contributed to many programs by radio artist Joe Frank. McKenna co-curated the 1998 exhibition Forming: the Early Days of L.A. Punk, for

Track 16 Gallery Track 16 is a contemporary art gallery in the fashion district neighborhood of downtown Los Angeles, exhibiting the work of contemporary artists. History Track 16, founded by Tom Patchett, co-founded the gallery hub Bergamot Station in 1994. ...

in Santa Monica. She was co-curator of ''Semina Culture:

Wallace Berman Wallace "Wally" Berman (February 18, 1926 – February 18, 1976) was an American experimental filmmaker, assemblage, and collage artist and a crucial figure in the history of post-war California art. Personal life and education Wallace Berman ...

& his Circle'', a traveling group exhibition that opened at the

Santa Monica Museum of Art The Institute of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (ICA LA), formerly known as the Santa Monica Museum of Art (SMMoA), is a contemporary art museum in Los Angeles, CA. As an independent and non-collecting art museum (or kunsthalle), it exhibits the ...

in 2005. She is producer and co-writer of '' The Cool School'', a documentary about L.A.'s first avant-garde gallery, and her book, ''The Ferus Gallery: A Place to Begin'', was published by Steidl in 2009. Her 2007 monograph on the photography of

, ''Wallace Berman Photographs'', co-written with

Lorraine Wild Lorraine Wild (born 1953, Ontario, Canada) is a Canadian-born American graphic designer, writer, art historian, and teacher. She is an AIGA Medalist and principal of Green Dragon Office, a design firm that focuses on collaborative work with ar ...

, was selected as one of the 50 best art books of the year by the AIGA. In 2009, she curated ''She: Work by

& Richard Prince'', for the Michael Kohn Gallery in Los Angeles. In 2010 McKenna curated ''The Beautiful and the Damned'', a show of photographs of L.A.'s early punk scene by Ann Summa. Her 2011 survey exhibition of photographer Charles Brittin was accompanied by the artist's monograph, ''Charles Brittin: West & South''. In 2010 she partnered with Donna Wingate and

to launch the publishing imprint Foggy Notion Books. In October 2015 it was announced that she was co-writing filmmaker

's "quasi-memoir" titled ''Life & Work''. The book, retitled ''Room to Dream,'' was published in June 2018. She has participated in Lynch's "Festival of Disruption," doing onstage interviews with Lynch,

Frank Gehry Frank Owen Gehry, , FAIA (; ; born ) is a Canadian-born American architect and designer. A number of his buildings, including his private residence in Santa Monica, California, have become world-renowned attractions. His works are considered ...

, Ed Ruscha, Sheryl Lee and others. Musician Dan Hicks spent hours on the phone with McKenna every Friday for several years before his death in 2016, telling her his life story. She edited the conversations into Hicks' posthumous autobiography, ''I Scare Myself'', published in 2017.

Books

*''Book of Changes'', Seattle: Fantagraphics Books, 2001. *''Talk to Her'', Seattle: Fantagraphics Books, 2004. *''Semina Culture: Wallace Berman & his Circle'', written and edited with Michael Duncan, New York, New York: Distributed Art Publishers, Inc., 2005. *''Wallace Berman Photographs'', written and edited with

, Santa Monica, CA, RoseGallery/Distributed Art Publishers, Inc., 2007. *''She: Work by

& Richard Prince'', Kohn Gallery/Distributed Art Publishers, Inc., 2009. *''The Ferus Gallery: A Place to Begin'', Göttingen, Germany: Steidl, 2009. *''The Beautiful & the Damned: Photographs by Ann Summa'', Los Angeles, California: Foggy Notion Books, 2010. *''Charles Brittin: West & South'', Los Angeles, California: Foggy Notion Books, 2011. *'' Richard Prince: Collected Writings'', Los Angeles, California: Foggy Notion Books, 2011. *''Notes From a Revolution: Com/co, the Diggers & the Haight'', edited with David Hollander, Los Angeles, California: Foggy Notion Books, 2012. *''Room to Dream'', written with David Lynch, Random House, 2018.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:McKenna, Kristine Living people American women journalists American art curators Los Angeles Times people Year of birth missing (living people) 21st-century American women American women curators