Open Season

by Jan Aird - KickArts Contemporary Arts
(Cairns QLD Australia)

The Henchman Wears Lace

KickArts Artist’s Feature Wall
Open Season
Kristen Tennyson
September 15–October 17

Born in Toronto, Ontario, artist Kristin Tennyson’s art practice has spanned two continents. After obtaining her BVA in Canada in 1993, she migrated to Australia and lives and works in Cairns.

Kristin has participated in many group shows and several galleries in Australia and Canada represent her textile wearable art works and paintings.

Kristin’s work evolves through combining textile work, painting and assemblage. Her unique approach to combining techniques of sewing, assemblage and embroidery with painting stretches the boundaries of the traditional view of the ‘wall hanging’ or two-dimensional painting. Currently Kristin is completing her Masters in Creative Arts at James Cook University.

KickArts is proud to exhibit Open Season, a body of new artworks by Kristin that are currently being presented on the Artist’s Feature Wall.

Kristin explains that “Open season is a term we used when the hunting season began in Toronto, and this series of new artwork is based on trophy hunting and collecting. Works are from personal childhood memories of friends and family hunting and displaying animal skulls as trophies.

Such memories include a brother dressing up as a cowboy in commando gear going out with my Granddad for a pellet shoot, my Uncle who was passionate about hunting (looking rather scary in lace), and my Aunties who used every part of the animal and displayed an animal head in the toile wall-papered dining room.

In this series I wanted to bring together my passions of sewing and painting. In these attempts I have used imprints of my loved tapestries and lace, sewn, ripped and dipped. As a result, the feminisation of hunting has emerged as a common theme throughout the work.

The bones, either wrapped in tapestry or sprayed with lace, create a starting point for the paintings. The paintings begin with a layering of Nana tapestry and lace, adding images that are reflective of my memories of Open Season, using raw sewing to outline my drawings. This has resulted in a mixed bag of painting mediums, however it has worked as a really exciting approach to creating my new series of trophy hunting and collecting.....to be continued.....

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