Karl Burkheimer is the head of the wood department at Oregon College of Art & Craft. He earned an MFA from Virginia Commonwealth University and a Bachelors in Environmental Design in Architecture from North Carolina State University at Raleigh, NC.
Burkheimer has taught courses covering conceptualization, wood working techniques, furniture design, foundry techniques, and interior design. His work, in a diverse employment of media, has been exhibited throughout the United States and has received several awards of recognition, including the 2001 Virginia Museum Professional Fellowship. Burkheimer's work has most recently been shown at the Museum of Contemporary Craft in Portland for the exhibition "Call + Response," and his solo exhibition "In Site" at Disjecta Interdisciplinary Art Center in Portland.
Artist Statement:
Mining many years of personal experience creating utilitarian and artistic objects, my creative practice is a convergence of diverse influences, negotiating a spectrum of curiosities, experiences, and knowledge. My aim is to develop work worthy of exploration and consideration: familiar yet distant, crafted yet curious, expressive yet grounded. If I am successful, the viewer is presented with work that elicits a pause, inciting reflection and a moment of looking beyond a passing gaze. Though the objects I create exist in the public realm as points of exchange, my work, the creative endeavor, lies in the making, the act and art of transforming materials into form and meaning. My exhibited work is a residue of process, a brief incarnation that becomes the seed for subsequent renderings.
Funding provided by the Brittingham Fund.
Click here for a map with parking and event location.
Parking: Parking is available at the City of Madison State Street Campus Ramp (entrances on Frances and Lake streets) and in the University Square parking ramp, entrance on Lake Street. Metered parking is available in the lower level of UW Lot 46, entrances on Lake and Frances streets. parking is also available in UW Lot 83 under Fluno Center, entrance on Frances Street, and in UW Lot 7 under Grainger Hall.