Bio

Karen Elizabeth Baker is a photographic based fine artist that practices the investigation of image making, from the gelatin silver prints she made early on to her current engagement with digital platforms. Her work explores photography’s link to time, images that conflate memory to a moment outside of the temporal flow. She sees the things behind what are actually in front of us, imagining history, family, memory, attempting to capture the essence of what is and reconcile the bittersweet longing for the past. She explores aspects of the human condition and the evolution of our social constructs. 

Baker studied photography and art history at UCLA and under artists Keith Carter, Roger Ballen, Shelby Lee Adams, Ed Freeman and Julie Blackmon She received a BFA in art and art history with a focus on analog photography from the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa. She has won awards from the New York Center for Photographic Art, the Los Angeles Center of Photography and Monochrome Black and White Photography Awards. Her work is in the collection of the Waiea, Ward Village, Honolulu. Baker has participated in innumerable group shows and six solo shows in Los Angeles and Honolulu.

Her images reiterate various tropes about landscape photography, architectural photography, narrative photography still life photography, and various other contemporary – notably, color – photographic practice. Bakerʻs inspirations originate from William Eggelston’s pioneering work in color, the still lifes of Roger Ballen and the New Topographic photographers Robert Adams, Stephen Shore and Henry Wesselʻs exploration with man altered landscapes.

 Exhibition History

GROUP

2024 Wrap it Up Show and Sale, 2024, Artists Council at the Galen, Palm Desert, CA

2024 Winter Solstice Exhibition 2024, Griffin Museum of Photography, Winchester, MA

2024 The Curated Fridge, Autumn, 2024, The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA

2024 Still Life exhibition, Gallerium and the Book of Arts

2024 Off the Wall 2024, Artists Council at the Galen, Palm Desert, CA

2024 Corporeality Exhibition, Art-Icon, 74 Blvd Richard-Lenoir 75011, Paris, France

2024 Color 2024, Artists Council at the Galen, Palm Desert, CA

2024 Center Forward 2024, Center For Fine Art Photography, Fort Collins, CO

2024 The Election Show: Postcards from the People!, Desert Open Studios, Cathedral City, CA

2024 Hot Times Cool Art, Artist’s Council at the Galen, Palm Desert, CA

2024 Historical Landmarks of the World, photoartpavillion.com

2024 The Curated Fridge, Spring 2024 Show, Panopticon Gallery, Boston, MA

2024 The Curated Fridge, Spring 2024 Show, https://www.thecuratedfridge.com/Fridge-Shows-1/Spring-2024

2024 LACP Thresholds 2024: Photography and Urban Architecture, Los Angeles, CA

2024 Wade Sisco Gallery Grand Opening, Palm Springs, CA

2024 Through the Lens Juried Exhibition, Artists Center at the Galen Palm Desert, CA

2024 The Curated Fridge, Winter 2024 Show, CAA Canal Gallery, Cambridge, MA

2024 The Curated Fridge, Winter 2024 Show, https://www.instagram.com/p/C2NX_jiCbSh/

2024 ACE Artists Council Juried Exhibition, Artists Center at the Galen, Palm Desert, CA

2024 Desert Open Studios, Indian Wells, CA

2023 Favorite Photo of 2023 Exhibition, Lenscratch, Los Angeles, CA

2023 Off the Wall, Artists Council Center at the Galen, Palm Desert, CA

2023 Winter Solstice Member Show, Griffin Museum of Photography, Winchester, MA

2023 Hats Off, 2nd Annual Austin Photography Exhibition, Austin, TX

2023 Earth Exhibition, Artists Council Center at the Galen, Palm Desert, CA

2023 Hot Times-Cool Art, Artists Council Center at the Galen, Palm Desert, CA

2023 29th Annual Online Memberʻs Exhibition, Griffin Museum of Photography, https://griffinmuseum.org/show/29mje_online/

2023 LACP Life Cycles exhibition, Inner-City arts, Los Angeles, CA

2023 Love Exhibition, Lenscratch, Los Angeles, CA

2022 Member’s Projections, Griffin Museum of Photography Winchester, MA

2021 Open Sea Leather/Art Gallery, Honolulu, HI

2021   Camera USA 2020, Naples Art, Naples, FL

2020   Art In The Time of Corona, Dab Art Co. https://www.dabart.me/atc-exhibit-page.

2020   26th Annual Juried Show, Griffin Online Exhibition, Griffin Museum of Photography, Winchester MA, https://griffinmuseum.org/show/26th-annual-juried-members-exhibition/

2020   Pacific New Media, Contemporary Photography in Hawaiʻi 2020, https://pnmlab.com/karen-baker/

2020   In the In-Between, Class of 2020, https://www.inthein-between.com/the-class-of-2020/

2020   UHM BFA 2020, University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa, Honolulu, HI, http://www.uhmbfa.com

2020   BFA Show 2020, stp, Serving the People, https://stp.world/pages

2016   Venice Art Walk, Venice, CA

2015   Incognito, Santa Monica Museum of Art, Santa Monica, CA

2014   Incognito, Santa Monica Museum of Art, Santa Monica, CA

2014   Venice Art Walk, Venice, CA

2013   Venice Art Walk, Venice, CA

2012   The Perfect Exposure Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

2010   Snap To Grid, LACDA, Los Angeles, CA

2009   Venice Art Walk, Venice, CA

2008   Venice Art Walk, Venice, CA

SOLO

2022 Segue, Hawai’i Pacific University Art Gallery, 2022-2023 Exhibition Cycle, Honolulu, HI

2017   Family Vacation,Town, Honolulu, HI

2013   Family Vacation, Mayhem, Mag Pi, Studio City, CA

2012   Family Vacation, City Center,Fox Studios Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

2010   Family Vacation,DKRM Gallery West, Santa Monica, CA

COMISSIONS

2017   Da Babiʻi, 30, 7”x10” photographs, Surfjack Hotel, Honolulu, HI

COLLECTIONS

2017   The Waiea Grand Penthouse, Ward Village, Honolulu, HI

AWARDS

2024 Rear Window, LACP, Threshold: Photography and Urban Architecture, Honorable Mention

2024 The Jungle, LACP, Threshold: Photography and Urban Architecture, Honorable Mention

2024 Shinshu Koyaki, LACP, Threshold: Photography and Urban Architecture, Honorable Mention

2024 Takara Apartments, LACP, Threshold: Photography and Urban Architecture, Honorable Mention

2024 Working Man, LACP, Threshold: Photography and Urban Architecture, Honorable Mention

2023 Moon Over, NYC4PA, Luminosity… The Impact of Light, Third Place Award

2023 Garden Party, LACP Life Cycles exhibition, 1st Prize Award

2023 Field of Dreams, LACP Life Cycles exhibition, Honorable Mention

2023 Curve, LACP Life Cycles exhibition, Honorable Mention

2023 LA River, LACP Life Cycles exhibition, Honorable Mention

2023 Orange Periwinkle, Monochrome International Black and White Photography Award

2023 Zabriski, Monochrome International Black and White Photography Award

2023 Felicity, Monochrome International Black and White Photography Award

2021 Fins, Monochrome International Black & White Photography Award

2021 Reid, Monochrome International Black & White Photography Award

2021 Wolf, Monochrome International Black & White Photography Award

2021 Sand Dune, Monochrome International Black & White Photography Award

2021 Lost Mine, Monochrome International Black & White Photography Award

2019 Wired, Monochrome International Black & White Photography Award

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Periodicals

2024 Sarah Garcia, “When you know, you know, pursuing a creative career”, CanvasRebel, August 19, 2024, https://canvasrebel.com/meet-karen-elizabeth-baker

2024 Ashley Davis, “Meet Karen Elizabeth Baker | Fine Art Photographer”, Shoutout Colorado, January 23, 2024, https://shoutoutcolorado.com/meet-karen-elizabeth-baker-fine-art-photographer/

2020   Mary Snyder, “Karen Elizabeth Baker, Photographer”, Q&A: An Interview

Magazine, Issue #1, August 2020, page #56-57

2020   Elizabeth Collazos, “A New Normal…sort of!”, Gemma Magazine, April 5, 2020

https://www.instagram.com/gemmamagazine/?hl=en

Reviews

2009   “The Kid Stays in the Picture: Karen Bakerʻs The Baby Socks it to Us”

Peter Frank, Senior Curator, Riverside Art Museum, Riverside, CA

The Kid Stays in the Picture: Karen Baker’s The Baby Socks it to Us

Karen Baker not only is a skilled photographer, but knows what skilled photography looks like. That is to say, Baker’s photography is about photographic skill – but by no means about simply replicating it. Her images reiterate various tropes about landscape photography, architectural photography, narrative photography still life photography, and various other contemporary – notably, color – photographic practice. But spank in the middle of these sober and evocative pictures, Baker has deposited an incongruous little creature whose very presence hijacks the meaning of his surroundings. That’s The Baby.

The Baby is apparently one of the world’s most–travelled monkey toys – or if he isn’t yet, he’s fixin’ to be.  Fashioned by Baker herself, the sock-shaped simian sets down in a string of seemingly seedy venues – or has to date.  Perhaps the photographer has some more glamorous locations in mind amongst which to shoot her progeny, but there’s a recession on, y’know, and besides, The Baby’s a baby and could hardly care less at this point.  Maybe for his bar mitzvah Baker will take him to Paris or Rio or Tokyo; until then, he’d better be satisfied with Chicago (well, could be worse) or Vegas (still could be worse) or even the Salton Sea (there, it got worse).

In fact, Baker has cast The Baby in a poignantly abject video short as the child of emphatically funky desert rats Bobby & Ginger who hide out from their big-city creditors by opening the “Economy Palms B&B” out by the Salton’s West Shore (“playground of the solvent and paroled”, as the brochure promises).  The Baby narrates the entire documentary, his upbeat (if occasionally befuddled or disgusted) outlook clearly reflecting the resilience he’s apparently inherited from his ever-hustling, ever-clueless parents.

The Baby appears in Baker’s still photographs, for the most part, without benefit of parental guidance.  But the brave little guy holds his own, whether posing before run-down sheds, on rumpled beds, or amidst desert-soil reds.  The reward comes with The Baby’s up-close-and-personal encounter with leading porn star (ret.) Jenna Jameson.  We’re privy only to the snapshots, not the money shots; but, then, The Baby, to reiterate, is just a kid.

For the photo-purists, the recurrence of this dopey gray lump of cloth in photos worthy of Robert Adams or Stephen Shore, or, rest his soul, Julius Shulman is a gnatworthy annoyance, a blemish that shows up time and again almost like a scratch on Baker’s lens.  But for the rest of us, The Baby is Baker’s “beard, “ the cover that gives her the moxie to replicate various of contemporary photography’s hoariest tropes.  Baker enlivens her otherwise deadpan (and gorgeous) New-Topographic, neo-conceptualist knockoffs with her moth-eaten offspring the better to critique, mock , and ultimately pay loving homage to her photographic forebears.  For all her japing with The Baby, Baker has learned a lot about looking at the world through the lens from the landscape photographers who have gone before her.

The Baby, then, is a William Wegman-type running gag in an Ansel Adams world, constantly interrupting the world’s abiding beauty with a nagging banality, but never managing to usurp the power of that beauty – or, in the final analysis, never even wanting to.  If The Baby begins as Baker’s anchor, he winds up her foil, the dwarfed narrator in the nature documentary who has the grace to stay dwarfed and happy.  The Baby isn’t simply the guy at the edge of the snapshot; he is the guide through the snapshot’s edgy world.

Peter Frank – Senior Curator at Riverside Art Museum, Riverside, California