About Kristen Martin Aarnio

A Dream Tangled

Kristen Martin-Aarnio (b. 1983, Massachusetts, USA) is a mixed-media painter and sculptor. She earned an AAS at Greenfield Community College in Greenfield, Massachusetts, in which she received the Medici Award and Archibald MacLeish Award for Art. She received a BA from the School of Visuals Arts in New York, New York. The artist has participated in exhibitions at New Jersey State Museum, New Jersey; Art150 Gallery, New Jersey; Queens Museum of Art, New York; Plaxall Gallery, New York; New Hope Arts, Pennsylvania; Atlantic Gallery, New York; Greenpoint Gallery, New York; and many others. She is an active member of ProArts NJ and the National Association of Women Artists. Kristen currently lives and works in Bayonne, New Jersey. 

Artist Statement

Looking at the world as a whole, I see systems working together, materials that don’t belong together somehow connecting. I see beauty in blending objects and placing them in a setting where they react to each other.   

I create mixed media paintings and sculptures. Materials deeply affect my work, sometimes evoking a memory or a physical feeling. I will wrap yarn around tape, glob on paint to twigs of a tree, glue on colorful fabric and cover everything is glitter. The work becomes colorful, textural, and lands between representation and abstraction. My process is playful and curious, bringing magically unexpected outcomes. 

As with systems, my work is about throwing objects around, putting items together that speak to and work with one another. I like artwork to be mysterious, not to give you all the answers, to make you think. I strive to create a piece that connects and provides the viewer with an emotional response. 

New Brunswick Art Salon 2022 —Oil and Mixed Media: “Beyond the Brush: The Contemporary Imagination”

EDUCATION:

  • 2007 School of Visual Arts, New York, NY. Bachelor of Fine Arts Degree 
  • 2005 Greenfield Community College, Greenfield, MA. Associate of Fine Arts Degree 

RESIDENCIES & WORKSHOPS

  • 2022 -Painting Workshop with Anya Kotler, Dingle, Ireland 
  • 2011 -Aux Follies An Improper Residency, In Rivers Art Space, Brooklyn, NY 
  • 2006 -Painting in Florence, School of Visual Arts, Florence, Italy 

SOLO & TWO PERSON SHOWS   

  • 2012 –Panda rides a unicorn down a rainbow eating a huge coconut cake party blowout!, Sapphire Lounge, New York, NY 
  • 2008 –Environments (solo), Piola, New York, NY 
  • 2005 -President’s Office, Greenfield Community College, Greenfield, MA 

EXHIBITIONS

2022 to 2023

  • 2022 New Jersey Arts Annual: Reemergence, New Jersey State Museum, Trenton, NJ 

2022

  • Call and Response, Shoebox Arts, https://shoeboxarts.com/ 
  • New Hope Arts Member Salon Exhibition, New Hope Arts, New Hope, PA 

2021

  • 2021 New Members Exhibition (National Association of Women Artists), NAWA Online Gallery, https://thenawa.org/product-category/new-members-show-2021/  
  • Curators Choice, Art150 Gallery, Jersey City, NJ 
  • LIC-A Members Showcase 2021, Plaxall Gallery, Long Island City, NY 
  • Rockland Virtual Arts Festival, https://www.rocklandartsfestival.org/ 

2020

  • Sculpture, New Hope Art, New Hope, PA 
  • Alphabet Soup, AlterWorks Studios Online Exhibition, Long Island City, NY 
  • LiC-A Spring 2020 Online Exhibition, https://www.licartists.org/spring-online-exhibition, Long Island City, NY 
  • Fundraiser for Medea of Euripides, Theater for the New City, New York, NY 

2019

  • Off the Wall Part II – Affordable Holiday Art Fair, Plaxall Gallery, Long Island City, NY 
  • Constitution, Con Artist Gallery, New York, NY 

2018

  • Rock, Paper, Scissors, Plaxall Gallery, Long Island City, NY 
  • str&#60l;k(t)SH&#60l;r, Con Artist Gallery, New York, NY 
  • LIC Arts Open Open 8, Plaxall Gallery, Long Island City, NY 

2017

  • LIC Fear, Plaxall Gallery, Long Island City, NY 
  • Live – Work – Play –NYC, LIC Arts Open Gallery at the Factory LIC, Long Island City, NY 
  • Walk the Light, Plaxall Gallery, Long Island City, NY 
  • January Blitz Art from Our City, Plaxall Gallery, Long Island City, NY 

2016

  • Fall Members Art Show, Plaxall Gallery, Long Island City, NY 
  • Fall Salon Show, LIC Arts Open, Long Island City, NY 
  • $99 Show, Con Artist, New York, NY  
  • Planet Connections Theatre Festivity, Paradise Factory, New York, NY 
  • Summer Salon Show, Greenpoint Gallery, Brooklyn, NY 
  • LIC Arts Open Group Exhibition, Falchi Building, Long Island City, NY 
  • Early Adopter Social, Brownstone Upper East Side(Impart NYC), New York, NY 

2015

  • Charity Silent Auction, Matted Gallery LIC, Long Island City, NY 
  • Members Salon Exhibiton Fall 2015 LIC-A, Falchi Building, Long Island City, NY 
  • Pop Up Event, Paper Factory Hotel, Long Island City, NY 
  • Celebrating Queens Artists & LIC-A’s 30th Anniversary, Falchi Building, Long Island City, NY 
  • Bridge to a New Art Frontier, Atlantic Gallery, New York, NY 
  • Winter Secrets, Local Project, Long Island City, NY 

2014

  • An Exhibition by LICA Members, Falchi Building, Long Island City, NY 
  • 10Squared Silent Auction, 2 Gotham Center, Long Island City, NY 
  • Mural on Treehouse by Benjamin Jones, Figment NYC, Governor’s Island, NY 
  • Decorate, Embellish, Adorn, Con Artist, New York, NY 

2013

  • LICARTISTS, INC: Independents Group Show, LIC Arts Open, Long Island City, NY 
  • I Feel FRIDAY: Ice Kingdom, Ancient Egypt, Atlantis, Tammany Hall, New York, NY 

2012

  • In The Place We Live 2012, M55 Art Gallery, Long Island City, NY 
  • Summer Art Exhibition, Sterling National Bank, Long Island City, NY 
  • Hoover Dam Collective Presents:  Silver Door, Red Lotus Room, Brooklyn, NY 

2011

  • Audacious, Uspace Gallery, Atlanta, GA 
  • Performance:  A Lotus Eating Horse in Odysseus at Hell Gate by the Processional Arts       Workshop, Socrates Sculpture Park, Queens, NY 
  • Corona, C.C.C.P Gallery, Brooklyn, NY 
  • Aux Follies Opening, In Rivers Art Space, Brooklyn, NY 
  • Our Silent Canvas Presents:  Echo of Elements, St, Peters Chelsea, New York, NY 
  • Group Show, The Townhouse Gallery, Brooklyn, NY 

2010

  • Indigenous Playground, Vellum Online, Boston, MA, http://www.v-e-l-l-u-m.com 
  • Self-Portrait Project, Art House Gallery, Brooklyn, NY 

2009

  • A Book About Death, Queens Museum of Art, Queens, NY 
  • Performance: A Carpenter in Music for 100 Carpenters by Douglas Henderson, The Boiler, Brooklyn, NY                                                                
  • Performance:  A Cashmere Carrot in Cashmere Carrot by Hayley McCullogh, Chashama Art Foundation Benefit Gala, New York, NY 
  • A Million Little Pictures:  Documentary, Art House Gallery, Atlanta, GA and San Francisco, CA 
  • Prospect Heights Art Walk, Hello Living Vol. 1, Brooklyn, NY 
  • The Astromonger’s Monster Challenge, The Showroom NYC, New York, NY 

2008

  • Arts Abroad:  France, Italy, Spain, School of Visual Arts Westside Gallery, New York, NY 
  • Lucky Kitty, The Showroom NYC, New York, NY  

2006

  • 8th Annual Abstraction International Art Exhibition, Upstream People Gallery, Omaha, NE 

2005

  • Fine Art Hits the Streets, Art Show Amherst Street Galleries Pittsfield, MA 

PUBLICATIONS: 

2016

2009

  • 9 Broken Hearts, Grenades, and Vultures, Lend Me Your Eyes Blog by Antonio Estevez, http://antonio-estevez.blogspot.com/2009/06/9-broken-hearts-grenades-and-vultures.html 

AWARDS

2005

  • Medici Award, Greenfield Community College, Greenfield, MA 
  • Archibald MacLeish Award for Art, Greenfield Community College Greenfield, MA