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Carole Kunstadt‘s works often invoke a metaphysical quality. They reference antique books, music manuscripts, maps and artifacts – deconstructing paper and text and using it in metaphorical ways. Through the manipulation of the materials – history, memory and time merge in a hybrid form. Born in Boston, Kunstadt spent her childhood in a small New England town, received a BFA from the Hartford Art School in Hartford, CT. and continued with postgraduate studies at the Akademie der Bildenden Künste in Munich, Germany. Twelve years ago she re-entered a familiar landscape as in her youth, moving to the Hudson Valley, after spending 35 years in NYC.
I discovered Kunstadt while working on the manuscript for my book, Weaving With Paper, and I’m delighted to have featured her work in the book. We included the following quote by her on one of the chapter openers.
“The continuous repetitive action of weaving is similar to reading and reciting, implying that,
through the repetition of a task or ritual, one has the possibility to transcend the mundane.”
We had a delightful conversation about how Kunstadt got into weaving (through textiles, then paper).
Interlude No. 23, by Carole Kunstadt, 2021. 8¼ × 8½ , thread, oak gall ink on paper—nineteenth-century music manuscripts published by Dantier/Paris. This weaving remixes hand-cut nineteenth-century music manuscripts, responding to the existing marks and their graphic patterns and recombining them.
We talked about her materials and how she sources old papers, which often lead to entire series.
Sacred Poem LXXXIX, by Carole Kunstadt, 2014. 5 × 6½ × 2½ , 24-karat gold leaf, interfacing, paper—pages from Parish Psalmody, dated 1849.
Kunstadt has created a delightful series of old postcards: “Altering the iconic images by weaving multiple views together, the pixelated scenes become intriguing alternate visions of a reality suspended from their original context.”
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You can find out more about Carole Kunstadt on her website and you can also find her on instagram.
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Carole Kunstadt’s recommendations:
- A PBS Off Book/Book Art mini-documentary includes Kunstadt in the segment Transforming the Sacred (3:35 min).
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Kennedy/Kunstadt Tapestries: view the commissioned tapestry after “This Day” by Helen Frankenthaler
- Paper & Ink Arts carries specialty papers
- In Praise of Shadows, by Jun’ichirō Tanizaki, an essay on Japanese aesthetics
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Music featuring excerpts of Makin’ Paper folk song by Peter Thomas. Listen to the full song and find out about other paper and book arts folk songs.
Gary A. Hanson did the sound editing for this episode. He practices and refines his skills in audio production while making his own podcast I’ll Have a Beer and Talk, a show about tech news, culture, weird animal stories and of course, beer. Gary is also the Deckle in Pulp & Deckle, a Portland-based community hand papermaking studio.
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