Do Undo Redo  performance : defaire et refaire une pelotte de fil de papier fait à partir de pages de dictionnaires en ville, Handmade Assembly, Struts & Faucet, Sackville, Nouveau Brunswick, 2017

Do Undo Redo performance : defaire et refaire une pelotte de fil de papier fait à partir de pages de dictionnaires en ville, Handmade Assembly, Struts & Faucet, Sackville, Nouveau Brunswick, 2017

My creative process has developed as a series of poetic investigations exploring human experience through language. I make words material. I use texts that I have either written, or borrowed, words drawn, or sculpted to explore ideas of absence, nothingness, time and memory. Experimenting ancient technologies of the textile arts such as spinning, weaving and papermaking is an integral part of my approach to making art. My choice to use these technologies is a reminder of the women who, for over 20,000 years contributed silently to our history and culture. My work is a remembering through the fingers.

It is the ephemeral and transitory nature of words that fascinates; I want to touch words; I want to touch the silence between words. Text in the word textile and expressions such as spinning tales reveal the historical connections between story telling, writing and early textile arts that are still alive today in our words and expressions. Paper, normally the invisible and often ignored support for writing is my material and metaphor of choice for representing silence and absence, this “almost nothing” that I continue to explore. Time is an important aspect of my approach to making art. Through a practice strongly linked to process, I am able to emphasize the slow repetitive gestures necessary to create a work over a long period of time. My final works are often hybrid forms of installation, sculpture, video, performance and artist books.

The work of Karen Trask key several media: installation, the artist's book, video and performance. She has had many solo exhibitions in Quebec, Canada, Europe and more recently in Tokyo. She has participated in group exhibitions in Canada, in Bogota, Kochi in India, in Mexico City, the United States and Europe, as well as artist residencies in Helsinki, Paris and Tokyo. Many of her videos have been shown at festivals in Europe and Canada. Her work are in public and private collections. Recently, she has presented solo exhibitions at Circa and at the Maison des arts de Laval.