getting to know the graduates
Graduating Student: Karolyn Greenstreet (W21)
My Process Paper is a performance in which I portray my great great great granddaughter, Klarhoq Grennod, who is writing from a future in which humans have found more reciprocity with the natural world and begun to help regenerate it. She recounts the totally historically accurate contributions of my time traveling great granddaughter, Dr. Katherine Greenfield, in helping establish this better future for Klarhoq’s generation.
My Graduate Exhibition is a multimedia exhibition that investigates the nuances of spatial experience in our current time of physical isolation and digitally mediated experiences, as well as the presence of non-human forces, such as water, that persist despite human intervention and struggle.
What was on your play list during your time at VCFA?
1st Semester:
2nd Semester:
3rd Semester:
4th Semester:
Who are your favorite protagonists in fiction?
I’m more into poetry and non-fiction. I don’t typically enjoy fiction – I find it hard to stay engaged. But I did recently read Octavia Butler‘s Parable of the Sower (which was insanely engaging) and I found the main character, Lauren Oya Olamina, to be so strong and thoughtful and such a good example of the type of intuition, ingenuity, empathy, and grit that will be needed in young people entering the future while dealing with the realities of climate change and inequality.
How did VCFA change your approach to thinking about your studio practice and your community at home?
I was really able to mobilize the resources of my community at home and create mutually beneficial relationships with many organizations and people in my city – relationships that did not exist to quite that degree prior to my entering the program. A nice surprise was that I also found a lot of confidence in my studio process while completing the program.
Prior to VCFA, I would often experiment quite heavily in the studio and be very hard on myself for not knowing immediately what I was doing or what the work was “about”. Now, I realize how important the experimentation and the not knowing actually is – it’s a crucial step in my process.
But the biggest change is that my end product now communicates with an audience and seeks to affect some sort of change in the world whereas with previous work, I was more interested in doing what made me personally happy or inspired. But I had become unhappy making that kind of work. It just wasn’t fulfilling to me anymore which is why I enrolled in VCFA in the first place.
I really wanted to enact a pivot in my studio practice and learn how to make work from a more critical perspective. As much as I tried to change that on my own, I really did ultimately need the guidance of the VCFA program to learn how. And the final crucial change (of course) is that my research and close observations now influence a lot more of the decisions I make in the studio.
What, or who, would you like to be?
That’s a tough one. I guess I would be my dog Obi-Juan because he’s incredibly spoiled and gets to sleep like 18 hours a day. I need 10 hours of sleep (sometimes 11 or 12) and our society just does not accept the needs of long sleepers, so if I were a dog, I would always get the sleep I need.
What is your favorite bird?
I love Myna birds because I think the sounds they make have a prehistoric quality to them.
It’s so cool.
And if I’m hearing those sounds, it means I might be in Hawai’i, which would be wonderful.
Who, or what is your work in conversation with?
What state/country do you live in?
Portland, Maine and now West Bath, Maine, USA
Tallis Holowka (W 21)
Chris Niemiec (W 21)