about – KAREN MICHEL

Welcome to my little corner of the web. I’m Karen Michel – glimmer hunter, mixed media artist and author creating Art as Ceremony.

My work explores the spiritual interconnectedness between humans and the living world. I build images from repurposed fabric, paint, drawing, and stitch – choosing reclaimed materials as both a sustainability practice and a symbolic one. In my hands, cloth becomes a story-carrier. Stitching fragments together becomes a devotional act of weaving past, present, and future into one surface, echoing the Norns – the weavers of fate and becoming.

Sketchbooking sits at the center of my practice. I see it as a radical creative ritual – a daily way to listen, witness, and stay in relationship with place. Rooted in animism, I approach the world as alive and communicative. My process follows the threads of symbol, memory, and land-lore – drawing from the collective subconscious and the visual libraries we inherit, carry, and remake.

My most current body of work, Land Spirits, is a fellowship-supported practice of mixed media animistic observation along Long Island’s southwestern coastline, with particular attention to the marshlands. It’s a study of ecology and story, native and naturalized kin, and the living intelligence of place – an ongoing invitation toward reciprocity, stewardship, and relationship with the more-than-human world.

Last year I completed The Artist as Naturalist, a year-long sketchbook study of the coastal region of southwestern Long Island, New York, supported by the Statewide Community Regrant Program, a regrant program of the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature, administered by The Huntington Arts Council, Inc.

I’m the author of Green Guide for Artist, The Complete Guide to Altered Imagery and has also contributed to many books and magazines in the mixed media art community. I’ve taught workshops across North America and continue to share process and practice on my YouTube channel.

the last name? it’s pronounced (me-shell)
★ instagram: @karenmichel ★ pinterest ★

* * * create your own magic * * *