Artist Bio ~ Karen Bernthal

My story:
From a first home near Elvis’s Graceland mansion to an adult life spent in places as far-flung as Greece and Japan, I’ve always enjoyed unique experiences. I bring that same delight in discovery to my craft, designing creative clothing that offers quirkiness with a heart. My latest twist is hip, casual yet stylish, inside out tops that take normally hidden seaming and transform it into a showcase element. My label name, Kirké, comes from Greek mythology and refers to the goddess Circe, who famously turned Odyssey’s men into pigs. My clothes don’t turn men into wild animals but they do turn the women who wear them into figures with perhaps just a little more divinity to them!

Committed to beauty, I also take great pleasure in gardening. Indeed, my wearable art aspires to be like a flower: a modestly alluring grace note that enlivens the environment it appears in.

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Artistic Statement:
  I’ve taken an American icon, the T-shirt, and re-envisioned it. T-shirts are ubiquitous and generally not very well designed, but still embraced by our culture. I seek to elevate T-shirts to wearable art status without losing qualities I admire, namely accessibility and comfort. I work with them as a form, much like a clay artist works with teapots as a form. I think of my wearable art as the apparel version of hand-made stoneware; casual, immediate, and well designed, but without the formality of porcelain. My aim is to keep the tops pure, which for me means without superfluous design. I offer texture and visual tension through raised seaming, sewn with a merrow machine, to create what I call squiggly embroidery. The thread color or, more accurately, the mix of colored threads in each raised seam transforms a constructive element, the seam, into a design feature. That transformation is vital because given the humble materials I use (jersey knit), the seaming unites utility and beauty.

Kirké clothing is made in my Northeast Minneapolis studio. I design the tops, draft all of the patterns and change them into the sizes that I offer. Debbie, my assistant, works with me 12 hours per week to help with sewing. I work full time. If you are visiting Minneapolis and would like to visit the studio, please call. If I am there, I welcome your visit.