Artist Bio
Karen Kurka Jensen is an accomplished contemporary ink and watercolor artist, who portrays her deep connection to nature through mystical landscapes and abstract images. Jensen grew up in Minnesota where she was sidetracked from a library career following a traumatic car accident. She went in search of alternative healing after doctors could not relieve her chronic pain. She met a traditional Chinese healer who not only treated her successfully but introduced her to Chinese culture and heritage. This “accident” led her down a path of discovery, falling in love with the art of sumi-e. Karen met and began studying with American sumi-e masters, Susan Frame and Susan Christie shortly after they returned from formal studies overseas in China and Japan, where their teachers were Zhuo He-Jun and Lu Yen Shao. She has continued research studies on her own from renowned sumi-e artists such as Diana Kan and Gao Xingjian.