Valerie Kirk: OPEN STUDIO

Valerie Kirk website

Design Canberra Festival

Passages and Portals - Networks Australia exhibition

 

Deborah Faeyrglenn, Tree-Sisters, Photographer Fiona Bowring

Christine Appleby, The Evidence is Everywhere, Photographer Fiona Bowring

Karyn Fearnside, The Stamp of Rubber Magpie and New Roman Times, Photographer Fiona Bowring

Susan Hey, Pathways, Photographer Fiona Bowring

Foreground: Ola Robertson, The Wasting Body; Background: Valerie Kirk, Namadji – Rocks, Photographer Fiona Bowring 

Sandra Obst, Rhythms, Photographer Fiona Bowring

Passages and Portals - Part two

September 9

-

October 19 2022

Networks Australia is a group of practising visual artists, living and working in Australia. We work in all mediums including textiles, sculpture, photography, painting and drawing.

Our exhibition titled ‘Passages and Portals’ consists of artworks inspired by Australian poetry. Poems are often passages and portals, offering new ways of seeing our natural surroundings and life experiences. In this exhibition, each artist has interpreted an Australian poem visually.

The Networks artists have invited a group of local Grenfell poets to include their own poetry in the exhibition, addressing the themes of Passages and Portals. These poems will be displayed among the artworks in the gallery.

Grenfell Art Gallery

CONFLUENCE: 2021 Valerie Kirk | Harriet Schwartzrock

 CONFLUENCE: 2021 Artist-in-Residence Exhibition

7 July - 27 August 2022

Valerie Kirk | Harriet Schwartzrock

The annual Craft ACT: Craft + Design Centre Artist-in-residence program supports local and national artists to each undertake a residency at Gudgenby Ready-Cut Cottage in the Namadgi National Park, and a two week research component within a national cultural institution in Canberra. The program facilitates access for the artist to national cultural, tertiary and research institutions and their collections, curators and researchers. A group exhibition of new work by each artist is held annually, and a catalogue produced about the program is disseminated internationally.

Presented in partnership with ACT Parks and Conservation Service and Geoscience Australia. 

Craft ACT + Design Center

Valerie Kirk is a Member of Networks Australia group 

ABOVE IMAGE: READY CUT 2021-61 
COVER IMAGE: VALERIE KIRK + HARRIET SCHWARTZROCK, GEOSCIENCE-2021. 5 FOOT PHOTOGRAPHY

Networks Australia Respond to Rusten House

Valerie Kirk, Rusten House Red Cross, fabric collage.

Craft / “Site Specific – artists respond to Rusten House”, Rusten House Arts Centre, Queanbeyan, until April 30. Reviewed by Meredith Hinchliffe. 

NETWORKS Australia, a group of practising visual artists based all over Australia, was invited to respond to Rusten House – its history, its architecture, the surrounding heritage garden, uses of the building and relationship to the community. 

Read Full review by Meredith Hinchliffe

Rusten House website

Craft ACT Residency with Namadgi National Park and Geoscience Australia.

Namadgi National Park. Photo Valerie Kirk 

Namadgi National Park. Photo Valerie Kirk 

Valerie Kirk, Photo Harriet Schwartzrock

Artwork by Valerie Kirk, photo Valerie Kirk 

Valerie Kirk

During the 3 week residency period at Namadgi National Park I stayed at Gudgenby Ready Cut cottage in the south of the park with fellow Artist in Residence, Harriet Shwartzrock. My project was to focus on the rocks and plants to think about time, impermanence, living in the present and being mindful of the past and future.

Looking at the rock outcrops and giant tors, which are a significant geological feature in the landscape, I was in awe of the solid forms and their history through millions of years past. Although often large and formidable in weight, they have been changed over time by the elements – rain, frost, fire and floods. I also looked at the plants as I walked noticing their forms and stage of going to seed in autumn and thought about how later this year they will flower again, a short cycle of growth and renewal.

During the residency I studied the granite rocks and plants, documenting the impact of fires, rain and climate change through expressive drawing and weaving “en plein air”. Aspects I  considered are: micro/macro, broad scale and focussed viewpoint, gesture, mark and texture.  How to evoke concepts of time, change, urgency, devastation, impact and generate future forward thinking – renewal, care, paying attention to Earth? Further development of experimental and creative work will allow me to reflect on ideas and generate a new resolved body of work for exhibition at Craft ACT in 2022.

Valarie Kirk

Valerie Kirk Geoscience Australia and Namadgi National Park Residency

Valerie Kirk and Harriet Schwarzrock in Geoscience Australia bulk storage, image @_5foot
 

 Fossil at Geoscience Australia, image  @_5foot

Rock Collection at Geoscience Australia, image  @_5foot

Valerie Kirk, drawing at Geoscience Australia,  image @_5foot

Valerie Kirk 

Craft ACT Residency at Geoscience Australia and Namadgi National Park.

Rocks, fossils, plants – understanding deep history and protecting land for the future.

The residency is a unique opportunity to research, understand and respond to climate change/environmental issues and contributing factors. It allows me to deeply engage with the Geoscience Australia collection and the physical environment of Namadgi National Park through my specific interests.

Rocks and plant fossils fascinate me because they evoke a deep sense of time, show changing climates and evolution of the surface of the Earth. They appear solid and mark endurance.

Australia’s botanical heritage, as witnessed in the fossil record, and contemporary diversity of plants gives me a connection to place and appreciation of each moment from seed, to flower then withering. The cycle continues for posterity.

My project  focuses on these elements and associated issues.

Part 1 of the residency – 9 days at Geoscience Australia, March 2021

Part 2 of the residency – 3 weeks at Namadgi National Park, April May 2021

@_5foot Photography 

Craft ACT 

Covet 2 - Gallery Overstroom

 Golden Lung 2 Sharon Peoples, machine embroidery

For those that participated in Covet 2 in Amsterdam at Gallery Overstroom, this is now the correct link to the exhibition if you would like to use it for CV's etc.
Covet 2

Open Studio Paris -Valerie Kirk

www.citedesartsparis.net
www.mayumi-inoue.com
www.valeriekirktapestry.com

The Cite International des Arts, Paris - Valerie Kirk

The residency provided me with a unique opportunity to disconnect from my commitments in Australia and immerse myself in the arts context of Paris. As an artist and tapestry weaver I wanted to visit museums/galleries/collections and respond in the studio. These experiences allowed me to deeply engage with traditional and contemporary art and tapestry and my specific research/practice interests.

As a basis for research and development of new works I explored The French Natural History Museum, Gallery of Palaeontology and Comparative Anatomy, housing the largest public display of invertebrate fossils. This gave me an opportunity to source visual material to use in new drawing, collage and tapestry. My intension was not to reproduce what I saw but to use the collection as a starting point to highlight the intangibility of the distant past and our relationship with it so that we can understand our place in time, location and space. This work builds on my previous “Floating Fossils” series of drawings, collage, stitch and tapestry, stemming from work at the Age of Fishes Museum, Canowindra, NSW. It allows me to accelerate my practice through focussed application to research and studio work.

Valerie Kirk is a Scottish born artist and tapestry weaver who now lives in Australia. She explores ideas about moving between two countries, identity and place in the world in relation to location and the perspective of time. Her imagery is developed from looking at textiles, landscape and fossils evoking the long distant past.

https://www.valeriekirktapestry.com/

Valerie Kirk, Paris 2019

Valerie Kirk, Paris 2019

Valerie Kirk, Paris 2019

Valerie Kirk, Paris 2019

Valerie Kirk, Paris 2019

Studio and works in progress from The Cite International des Arts, Paris, September-October 2019.
Valerie Kirk
https://www.valeriekirktapestry.com/

The delight of embroidery now 2018 Chaozhou International Embroidery Art Biennale

Marie-Bergstedt-Chinese-Minority-Group-artists-and-Valerie-Kirk

Famory Workshop

In 2018 I travelled to China for the inaugural 2018 Chaozhou International Embroidery Art Biennale, launched in Chaozhou, Guangdong Province. It was an important event supported by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism of the People’s Republic of China with many local and national government, cultural and industry figures attending.
Valerie Kirk 

There was a grand opening ceremony with the golden glitter of the “long bar” ritual, symposium, formal dinners, exhibitions and workshop visits. The exhibitions featured works under three topics, “Life & Fashion”, “Inheritance & Rejuvenation”, and “Integration & Transcendence”, and they continued until January 5 2019. Over 300 designers from 13 countries, including China, Australia (Valerie Kirk, Ema Shin, Sera Waters and Jane Theau), Poland, Denmark, Germany, South Korea, the Netherlands, Canada, USA, Norway, Japan, Sweden and Switzerland were represented.

Read Full Article GARLAND Magazine

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Garland is a platform for thoughtful writing about beautiful objects made today across the Indo-Pacific. Launched in 2015, Garland is produced by the World Crafts Council – Australia, a national entity of the World Crafts Council – Asia Pacific. 
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Installation of Trees: As Above So Below No 4

Rozalie Sherwood,  Tree of Life 2017

Susan Hey, The Trees Gift 2017

Susan Pfanner, Nest 2017 Photo by Sue Aylen

Susan Pfanner, Nest 2017

Valerie Kirk, Round and Around 2017

Covet at Barometer Gallery

Sharon Peoples, Golden Lungs; Valerie Kirk, Coveting Time; Nancy Tingey, With Apologies to Arthur Boyd. Photo Wendy Dodd

Valerie Kirk

Artist’s Statement

“Measuring Time”, a work in woven tapestry, is inspired by visits to the Age of Fishes Museum at Canowindra, NSW where I have drawn from the extensive collection of fossil fish. The specimens on display were discovered through a chance encounter in 1955 and they provide a view into life during the Devonian Period - the 'Age of Fishes'. The objects are evidence of life in our distant past and through their study and research we come to understand more about our world and its evolution. For me as an artist the collection provides a fascinating space for imagination and creative work exploring the gaps between the actual specimens and an imagined reality.

Valerie Kirk, Measuring Time, 2014

Valerie Kirk, Measuring Time, detail,  2014

 Valerie can be contacted through the Australian National Universities textiles department.
ANU Textile Department 
ANU Facebook 
Also
https://www.facebook.com/valerie.kirk.73345