Karen Hymer was born in Tucson, Arizona and has spent most of her life in the Sonoran desert. Karen’s experience and technical interests are wide-ranging. Although “trained” as a photographer and educator, her approach to image making explores the blending of photosensitive materials, digital media, and printmaking. She is fascinated with how the passage of time affects the human body and other natural elements in the world. She works with various photography processes including photopolymer gravure, cyanotype, palladium, gum dichromate and photo-encaustics.
Hymer actively exhibits her work both nationally and internationally. Her work is featured in Clay Harmon’s book Polymer Photogravure: A Step-by-Step Manual, Highlighting Artists and Their Creative Practice, is included in Jill Enfield’s Guide to Photographic Alternative Processes and is in several public collections, including the Center for Creative Photography and the Polaroid International Collection.
In addition to working as a fine art photographer, Karen has taught photography for over 25 years at Pima Community College, Tucson, AZ. She relocated to Silver City, NM in the summer of 2018 to open and operate Light Art Space at 209 West Broadway. The space features galleries, wet darkrooms, a printmaking studio, and teaching space. Workshops in photopolymer gravure, cyanotype, wet plate, watercolor, printmaking, and other art processes are offered.
Recent work, Age & Seduction, explores the effects of time on the human body and various plant life. Her richly detailed photogravures emphasize the interplay of texture, pattern, light and shadow in muted earth tones. Through the photopolymer gravure process she utilizes historic photographic methods, traditional printmaking techniques and digital technology. Dark Spring Press released the first book of her work in April 2018.
As a response to the COVID-19 pandemic, Karen completed a Series of photopolymer Gravures titled “Solitude”. These dark and mysterious forest images express feelings of mourning and fortitude, speaking to the complexity of this collective experience.. Other recent work include the Chaos series of wet cyanotypes, Return to Enchanted Lands - images backed with gold leaf, and Phyto Illusions, a series of phytograms backed with gold and copper leaf.