Karen Zhou
compositions
fragments
vessels
interiors
beginnings
about
library
Karen Zhou is an artist based in Brooklyn, New York. Her work explores the mutability of form, myth, and devotion, informed by her nomadic upbringing across the US, Hong Kong and Belgium. Working primarily in clay, she creates artifacts and mixed-media compositions that evoke Western relics of contemplation while reorienting towards a spirituality of interconnectedness. Zhou is a self-taught artist with a BSc in Mathematics, BSc in Economics, and Minor in Architecture from MIT. Her work has been exhibited at Patton-Malott Gallery (Colorado), A.I.R. Gallery (New York), Powerhouse Arts (New York), and Clayworks (New York). She has participated in residencies and workshops at Anderson Ranch (Colorado), Arcosanti (Arizona), Pocoapoco (Mexico), and Domaine de Boisbuchet (France).
My work is grounded in the belief of one energy that is the source of all things—mineral, body, plant, mountain, breath. I look across centuries and cultures for stories that echo this, finding tales that bind flesh and earth in Taoist cosmologies, Indigenous myths, contemporary fiction. A heart ripens into a strawberry. A seed evolves to horse, then human. These images take root in my hands as I begin to build.
I work with clay for its plasticity and its legacy as an ancient material. I coil volumes and press reliefs against molds cast from objects chosen for their symbolic weight. As forms emerge, some are given the armor of glaze; others remain fragile, washed in watercolor and paint. Some pieces stand alone. Others gather into altars and constellations, offering rhythm and space like a story unfolding, asking you to notice what’s beyond the visible—like breath held in stone. They rest on structures that range from provisional to architectural, embodying the varied language of devotion.
Through this work, I navigate the space between transformation and connection, ruin and endurance, makeshift and monument. I am reminded: nothing is fixed. Everything changes. Everything returns.